


Egotober 2020

by Inkribbon796



Series: Masks and Maladies [97]
Category: Jacksepticeye Fandom, Markiplier fandom - Fandom, Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, And some therapy, Angst, Anti took advice from the wrong person, Author Has No Chill, Birthday Post, Blackmail, Body Horror, Cannibalism, Chaos boys, Crazy cultists, Cultural Differences, Curious snek boi, Cursed objects, Demon Dogs, Fluff and Angst, Host uses his powers to cheat, Illinois is an adrenaline junkie, Jack’s hat, Jealousy, M/M, Magic, Mild Gore, Overprotective Wilford, Protective Anxiety | Virgil Sanders, Sibling Bonding, Sibling Rivalry, Smoking, The Host needs a hug, The Most Dangerous Game references, Visitation Day, dark angst, misinterpretation, sibling shenanigans, superhero au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:15:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 36,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26739472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkribbon796/pseuds/Inkribbon796
Summary: A collection of my Egotober shorts, unlike last year I’m compiling them all in one place.Here in you can find:-fluff-angst-sibling shenanigans-and much, much more!
Relationships: Antisepticeye/Henrik von Schneeplestein, Anxiety | Virgil/Creativity | Roman/Logic | Logan/Morality | Patton, Bingle, Celine | The Seer/Mark Fischbach (Past), Eric Derekson/Illinois, Mark Fischbach/Amy Nelson, The Host/Dr. Iplier, darkstache
Series: Masks and Maladies [97]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538131
Comments: 213
Kudos: 40





	1. Childhood Terror

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> PSA! Do not fire t-shirt cannons directly at people! You will hurt them. The Author is just being dumb. A reminder that Kay (Kaylor) is King of the Squirrels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: T-shirt

~::~ Six Years Ago ~::~

Kay and Illinois were playing chess at the Manor’s kitchen table, Kay currently had Illinois on the defensive, but except for the occasional click of the chess clock and the  _ clack _ of chess pieces on a board so old it was made of legitimate ivory and the board was marble, the two young teens were quiet.

Arthur burst in and shouted, “Dodge this, fucker!”

Illinois didn’t even turn around before he dove for the floor, which left Kay unfortunately in the line of fire, and before he could look up he was hit square in the chest by something so hard it knocked him and his chair back and all he could see was white. The young teen was in so much pain that he couldn’t even scream . . . yet.

“Shit!” Illinois swore as he ran over to Kay who was on the ground. “Kay?”

Then he looked back at Arthur, who looked nervous. “What did you do?”

“I don’t know, is he dead?” Arthur asked as he came around the table, a t-shirt cannon in hand. “Help me hide the body, before the Old Man finds me.”

“Fuck off,” Illinois told him.

Kay let out a choked sob, before he started wailing in pain.

Almost at that same second, Dark was on top of them, his aura ripping the t-shirt cannon out of Arthur’s hands and angrily throwing it against the wall. The Entity shoved Illinois and Arthur out of his way and knelt over Kaylor who was limply clutching his chest.

“Can you breathe?” Dark demanded, looking Kay over with parental desperation.

The young teen’s answer was a pained scream, and Dark took that as a solid  _ yes. _

He used his aura to carefully scoop the teen up and glared at Arthur, “We’ll talk afterwards.”

Then the Entity rushed into a portal, heading to a doctor.

Arthur was standing in the kitchen with a look of pure fear on the young author’s face. “I’m so dead.”

“Yeah,” Illinois nodded in agreement. “What was that thing?” 

“It shot t-shirts so I was going to shoot you in the head for being a shitheel,” Arthur admitted, as if that was a perfectly reasonable thing to do and say.

Illinois stared at him and remembered Kay’s screams, “You’re an absolute asshole.”

“I didn’t mean to hit him,” Arthur defended heatedly. “I meant to hit  _ you. _ It’s not like it’s a gun.”

Illinois shoved the notebook out of his hands and kicked it across the kitchen. Arthur gasped in horror and hit Illinois in the face for his act of violence. The two teens began a violent fist fight.

Arthur threatened, trying to reach for his notebook, “Oh, I am going to make you choke on your own tongue when I get my pen back.”

Suddenly they were both pulled apart by Dark’s aura and pinned to the ground. Both of them were spitting and cursing in anger.

“I can’t leave any of you alone, can I?” Dark fumed in anger.

“He tried to kill me!” Illinois accused.

“He kicked my notebook!” Arthur screamed in a blind rage.

Dark rolled his eyes and sent both of them into a different portal, making sure Arthur and his writing powers were safely contained in a little pocket space so he could simmer and write out his anger without hurting someone. Illinois was shut up in his room for his part in the fight.

The Entity would later check the camera system he’d had set up around the house ages ago by Google. Only after he was sure Arthur would stay put and Kay was actually okay despite his four cracked ribs and furious anger at Arthur for being shot at. It had become a must as his children grew older and their personalities began to settle.

Illinois would be grounded for three days, which actually turned into just six hours, for punching Arthur and starting the fight. And Arthur would be grounded for a week, which only turned into a day, for the mess with the t-shirt cannon and threatening Illinois.

Dinner that night was awkward, Dark having to put up his aura as a protective barrier so Arthur and Illinois didn’t kick each other underneath the table as the three teens involved glared at each other in angry silence.

Kay was the first one to break the silence by flipping Arthur off while he was grabbing the juice pitcher, starting an argument in its wake.


	2. Guard Duty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The apprentices get pranked by their mentors when they have them guard a “magical rock”. Some figure out the prank faster than others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Stone  
> Pre-zombie Robbie. Eef is Eef, and Eric desperately needs several hugs and some therapy.

~::~ Six Years Ago ~::~

“Okay Marv had to run out so we need you guys to watch it,” Mark said as he walked into the room with the hero’s four apprentice sidekicks behind him. Almost like ducks in a row. Ethan just behind him, holding onto Randall’s arm from behind, and Robbie meandering a couple steps behind Eric with his hands stuffed into his pockets.

Inside the room it looked like a complete mess, shelves and storage boxes overturned and thrown to the side. Jackie was standing in front of a table that had a rock twice as big as his hand just sitting in the middle of it. The speedster was backing away slowly

Robbie walked over to the table, took one long look at the circle and rolled his eyes, making a pissed off huffed, “It’s just a rock.”

“Like just a _normal_ normal rock, or just a normal magic rock?” Randall asked.

“It’s not magic,” Robbie told them.

“How do you know?” Ethan said, getting up close up in Robbie’s personal space, “we’ve seen all kinds of stuff.”

Robbie walked over to the table and threw the rock on the ground. After a minute or two, when nothing happened, Robbie looked quite proud of himself, “See? Bunch a fooking’ practical jokers. I know Marv’s line work, an’ that’s some absolute bullshite.”

Eric rushed over to pick up the rock and set it back in the fake spell circle. Then he stood right in front of it, continuing to watch it.

To Eric it didn’t matter if the rock was a joke or the heroes were pulling a prank. All that mattered was that he’d been told to do something, and he was petrified of them coming back and not finding him there doing his job.

He’d seen Silver punch his way through a brick wall, watched Jack run so fast he set things on fire. They had promised they would never hurt him, but Eric knew they would get tired of pretending to be nice eventually. He just didn’t want it to be today, he wasn’t ready for it.

“Let’s clean this place,” Randall shrugged. “Those two made a mess ‘a the place.”

“How ‘bout we fookin’ leave it,” Robbie suggested, already halfway towards the door. “Bastards made the mess, not our job.”

Ethan let out a disappointed sigh, “I wanted to see a magic rock.”

“I’ll ask Marv,” Robbie smiled at him, already halfway out the door.

Randall started to leave with them before realizing that Eric was still standing there in front of the table, only moving to fidget. “Eric, come on, the heroes are jokin’ around.”

Eric looked even more nervous, shuffling closer to the table and looking terrified.

Randall took in his friend’s expression and sighed sadly, poking his head back out of the room, “Hey, Eef, R, get back in here, we’re cleaning the room!”

Robbie stomped back over, “And why should I—”

His expression lightened when he saw Eric finch at his anger, Ethan poking his head through the door and frowning sadly at Eric.

“Yeah come on,” Robbie nudged Ethan’s shoulders, “an’ close the door so we can get some payback.”

Ethan smiled as he closed the door behind them with his foot, smiling, “I think I got an idea.”

Robbie returned the smile, and just tugged one of the shelves upright, “Yeah?”

“I don’t think Silv’ and Jackie have seen a rock floating before,” Ethan grinned.

“Pretty sure they have, but I like that train ‘a thought,” Robbie smiled and grabbed one of the pushed aside chairs and set it upright next to Eric. “Here yah go, pal.”

Eric looked conflicted, “ _Uh,_ I . . . but you— _uh_ . . .” He wasn’t meeting Robbie’s eyes.

“Yer on rock watchin’ duty, take a seat, an’ make sure it doesn’t move or breath fire,” Robbie told Eric.

Eric hesitated, looking at the chair with a bit of trepidation before he sat down, “Wh-What if it, _uh, uh,_ it _um_ moves?”

“I’ll slap it back inta place,” Robbie dismissed and the other three apprentices started cleaning up.

After a while Eric felt safe enough to stop staring at the rock and step away from the table. He helped to move smaller objects and when Silver and Jackie came back to check on their apprentices, with huge cheeky smiles, Eric helped the other three apprentices pretend that the rock was _actually_ dangerous and cursed.

Ethan made the rock float as he stood invisible, and Eric hid under the table, hiding his face from the two heroes.

And when the revenge joke was over and the others heard a little quiet chuckle and saw a small smile from their shyest teammate, well the older heroes couldn’t even try to pretend to be upset and the other apprentices considered it a victory.


	3. What is a Human?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Janus sees Oliver while he’s out with Bing and Virgil, and he gets a bit curious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Insert Castlevania reference here . . .  
> Prompt: Yellow

Bing and Oliver were getting a bit brave, or at least Oliver was. It was a mix of improved encryption and Google getting less aggressive in his attempts to take Oliver back. Whether that was because he’d actually given up or was planning an attack, Oliver wasn’t sure.

But he was out with Bing and Virgil at the skate park that Bing liked to hang out at. Oliver was mostly watching him, in addition to acting and feeling more human Oliver had more than a heightened sense of self preservation. But he had balanced on Bing’s skateboard a couple times before backing off.

Virgil was in one of his calmer moods and was just sitting at the other side of the park, his journal propped up on his knees he occasionally glanced around to glance around the park.

For a bit Oliver considered joining him before one of the people Bing had been talking to sat next to him on the bench. The young man had dusty brown hair, a black sweater and a grey beanie with a little yellow ouroboros pin on the side.

“Hey, you that Ollie guy that Bing’s always talks about?” He asked.

“I suppose,” Oliver evaded, hands folded neatly in his lap.

“Well either you are or you’re not,” the young man smiled.

At that moment Virgil was suddenly on the young man’s other side and swatted him right on the head with his journal.

“Oww!” The man snapped at Virgil, reaching up to grab his own head. “What was that for?”

“I’m not going to just let you slide in and mess with him,” Virgil was almost hissing in anger. “He’s not part of the League anymore, get away from him.”

Before Oliver could fully analyze the situation one of the young man’s eyes turned yellow and he spoke back up, this time with a much more familiar voice, “Now Virgil, I just wanted to talk.”

__ _ Voice Analysis Complete: Deceit _

__ _ Recommended Response: Do not draw attention. _

Oliver looked over to Bing who was watching them suspiciously. Whatever he saw on Oliver’s face had him walking over.

“Bull,” Virgil glared at Janus. “I didn’t even know you knew how to skate, what do you want?”

“To talk,” Janus scoffed. “I wasn’t aware that was a crime, should I be expecting Ro to join our side then?”

“You okay?” Bing asked, looking at the three of them.

“I think so,” Oliver told Bing, but his hand was already reaching up for Bing’s hand.

“Yeah?” Bing sounded unsure.

“I just want to talk, if you all want to join in the conversation you’re more than welcome to participate,” Janus smiled.

“Deceit,” Bing greeted. “What yah gonna talk about?”

“Probably Coalition secrets,” Virgil warned suspiciously.

Janus gasped, sounding scandalized, “All the years you’ve know me, and you think I’d be so crass as to just ask.”

Then he smiled, leaning closer to Virgil, “But if you gave them to me, I certainly wouldn’t say no.”

Virgil hissed quietly, almost under his breath, looking about ready to hit him again.

“But I’m really here for you,” Janus smiled at Oliver. “The robot with a soul, I’ve always had so many questions about it but, surprise, surprise, Google never let me get close enough to you. He must have been afraid I’d say something and you’d get ideas.”

“Google isn’t afraid of anything,” Oliver stated as if it was common fact, and it usually was.

“That’s a laugh and a half,” Janus chuckled. “If he wasn’t afraid, he would have never made  _ you _ . But you are just so . . . I don’t know what you are but I do believe you’re more socially literate than most humans I’ve actually seen.”

“Uh, thank you?” Oliver told him.

“What type of programs were used to make you?” Janus’s asked.

“Google just filtered out distractions,” Oliver admitted.

“I meant the other stuff, your restraint around other people,  _ “kindness” _ and being civil to the complete asshole who was talking to you a couple blocks down the road is a learned behavior.”

“You saw that?” Oliver asked.

“Of course, I’ve been taking notes,” the deceitful Side smiled. “A robot that wants to be human. Like Pinocchio and his strings, except you cut those yourself, didn’t you?”

“I’m not—” Oliver started before stopping, Janus didn’t jump into the conversation, clearly interested in hearing his answer. “I don’t want to kill because Google tells me too, I’m not his arm anymore.”

“And the other  _ “Google’s” _ think differently?” Janus asked.

“Green and Red hold different information, they don’t care about humans,” Oliver answered. “Bing trusts the humans he spends time with, so I do too.”

“Awww, babe,” Bing smiled.

“That’s all it takes?” Janus asked.

“He knows them better,” Oliver looked over at Bing. Bing smiled down at him.

Janus rolled his eyes, standing up, “Well if you two are going to start making out, I’m leaving. Besides I’m pretty sure Vee called for more heroes.”

Virgil hissed at him quietly again.

Throwing his nice illusion over himself, Janus began walking away, Bing followed him, not talking until they were almost out of the park.

“Yer not gonna tell Googs, right?” Bing asked. “I don’t wanna scare Ollie away from the park.”

“I’m not part of the League, Dark kicked me out,” Janus hissed. “Dark can piss off, and so can his network.”

“Okay, thanks,” Bing gave him a thumbs up.

Janus rolled his eyes at the blatant and naive trust. “I know what you are, is it painful to deny it?” Janus asked.

“Yeah totally, as easy as breathin’ Serpens,” Bing smiled. “Best choice I ever made, I don’t like terminatin’ things. Googs doesn’t deserve to be punished because he liked information more than spying.”

Janus gave a small smile, “Well have fun on your day off, I’m off to go mess with Dark’s work.”

“Good luck stormin’ the castle,” Bing wave and started skating back to the other, Janus quickly disappearing in one of his illusions. The trio didn’t see him for the rest of the day but the deceitful Side’s curiosity far from sated.


	4. What we Chose to Forget . . .

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Host is out to repair some of the damage between him and King, unfortunately it doesn’t go as planned but it’s the thought that counts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Fish

Host and King liked to pretend they had buried the hatchet. That the Author was dead and the memory of everything he had done had been put in the grave with him.

And usually they could. But sometimes the Host would do or say something that reminded the other of the Author and King would get snappy or leave the room wholesale.

The Host hated it, the shadow that the Author’s memory had cast was long and mired with blood. With Dark always hovering at the edges of the base or near King’s park, King was obviously getting frustrated but rarely said anything about it. It was a frustration that bled back into King’s tension around the Host.

So the Host wanted to do something about that, there were a lot of things that the Host wanted to apologize for. Things the Author had done or said, particularly to those that had cared about him.

It took a couple minutes, careful research and words that breathed matter and then there sat a fish tank with a single grey, red, and white halfmoon betta fish. It had a forest of moss and plants.

Using his visions to double check his work, the Host went to go and find King.

King was in his room in the base, working on several books that contained Cambodian, German, and Portuguese. He seemed to be working on something for the other heroes.

“The Host asks if King of the Squirrels is busy,” the Host walked in, making the other young man jump.

When his narrations informed him of that, the Host started to calmly apologize but King waved him off.

“It’s fine,” King told him. “What is it?”

“The Host has something for the King of the Squirrels, if the Host can distract his attention for a bit?” The Host smiled.

“Sure, yeah man,” King fully turned away from his books. “What’yah need?”

With only a couple sentences the Host made the fish tank and a small table for it to sit on. “The Host decided to get that fish that the King of the Squirrels always wanted as a child.”

King stared at the tank and the objectively gorgeous fish inside, and tried to remember when or if he’d ever wanted a fish. But then he remembered having a fish plushie or five among his childhood collection, so he had to have asked for one at one point or another.

“Host, I can’t take care of a fish, I can barely talk to them,” King said nervously. “She’s really pretty but I’m kinda a rodent guy.”

The Host in all his eloquence replied, his enthusiasm deflated, “Oh.”

“Hey, Yancy would probably love her,” King smiled. “You did a great job with the tank, I love it.

“The Host probably should have realized you did not truly want a fish,” the Host apologized.

“Let me see her,” King interrupted, getting up to take a closer look. “She got a name? You got a name princess?”

Silence.

“King does not have to take the fish if he doesn’t not want it,” the Host reminded.

“Well she’s here now,” King corrected firmly. “And I’m not going to keep you from taking responsibility for the things you create. Right?”

“Of course,” the Host agreed.

“Okay, if Yanc really, _really_ wants her, he can have her, but she’s mine now,” King told him. Then he looked at the fish, “You partial to a name?”

Then he waited, frowning, “Yeah, didn’t understand a word.”

“The Host thought that King could speak to all animals?” the Host questioned.

“I know how to talk to mammals and birds, but fish are completely different, it took me forever to learn how to talk to birds, and fish have completely different ways of interacting and communicating with the world around them.”

King’s eyes narrowed in concentration, “But you’re a betta, so what about Artemis? Huh?”

The fish gave no indication that either of them existed, or she just didn’t care as she swam in circles or just floated there.

“Yeah, Artemis it is,” King smiled. “Hey Host, help me move her.”

The Host smiled as he used his aura to help move the fish tank and the table to sit against a wall. The seer even helped to procure some fish flakes and equipment for Artemis.

King would wind up keeping Artemis, and introducing his three rats safely to her. Yancy would also joke that King was becoming more like Dark by the day, just with animals instead of human children. King would snap and yell at him before admitting that Yancy had been right.


	5. Life is Ours to Chose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wil is not the only mind twisted and affected but the Manor, Dark is not immune to the House’s effects, to the mismatic soul rot that exists therin. There comes a point in every child’s life when they realize that their parents are not invincible, Illinois just thought he already knew that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Care  
> *comes in like a fancy waiter* okay who here at this table ordered a Dark angst special with a side order of WKM implications about that crib that Mark and the team didn’t want to take out of the master bedroom because they didn’t want to move or break anything in the room? No one? Okay, guess I’ll just leave this on the table.  
>  And, yes I know that crib is supposed to 100% have absolutely nothing to do with the plot, but in the same livestream (The “I Explain Everything” livestream the team did for a charity event) he said to ignore him and go with what was in the videos first, so there.

Illinois had plans for the day, a nice little date with Eric. It had been a while since he’d been able to get Eric alone for some couple’s time. He’d gone to the main warehouse to show face for a bit before slipping away . . . but Dark wasn’t there.

He asked around and Google and Ed hadn’t seen him. He’d never shown up. So Illinois turned back around and went back to the Manor, a bit worried.

Over the years Illinois had figured out or been told information about Dark’s past. About Damien and Celine. Most of this information had been gleaned by Illinois’s curiosity over the years, exploring the Manor and generally being more observant than the rest of his siblings. Other times Dark personally confided the information to him since Illinois already knew things about him. Of course it was nothing overly detailed, just enough to understand.

The information only made the two of them closer. Illinois didn’t know everything about Dark and Wilford’s past, but he knew enough.

So when Illinois walked into the Manor he could feel something was wrong. It wasn’t just quiet, Illinois could almost hear his own blood pumping in his ears it was so quiet.

Then . . .

“Sweetie where are you‽”

Suddenly, at that cry the Manor seemed to fold itself around and Illinois was standing right in front of the master bedroom, the doors thrown open and an absolute mess inside.

Against one of the walls, under a large window was a black metal crib. It had been Bim’s crib when he was a baby. Dark had placed it up in the attic. But this time instead of being under a fabric cloth, it was back in the open, decorated with toys and a mobile overhead with stars. The room was a complete overturned mess. As if someone had been looking for something.

“Marc, where’s—” Dark demanded from behind Illinois, her voice urgent with almost panic.

Illinois looked behind him to see Dark, looking like her red soul. She froze when she met Illinois’s eyes.

The Manor seemed to ripple in some silent command. Dark looked confused before letting out a sigh of relief, “Ugh, it’s been such a long day.”

“Everything okay?” Illinois asked.

“Yeah, sweetie, don’t worry, I just thought,” she looked away, “nevermind.”

“No it’s okay,” Illinois tried to reassure her, as she walked past him and went into the master bedroom to clean up. The adventurer noticed instantly that the crib was conspicuously absent, but there was a clear clean spot in the mess where the crib had once been. “What happened?”

Dark smiled and turned back to pluck his hat off his head and start smoothing down his hair with her other hand. “Don’t you worry about that sweetie,  _ ugh, _ you have such nice hair, don’t hide it.”

“You usually don’t mind the hat,” Illinois reminded her, and she smiled at him.

Dark held out the hat, “Well you’re a nice boy, and goodness knows you’ve got your father’s confidence but you can never have too much help.”

“My old man’s confidence?” Illinois chuckled, taking his hat back but not putting it back on just yet.

She was already walking to the room, muttering to herself, “ _ Ugh, _ that bastard probably did this.”

“You need any help?” Illinois offered, something just wasn’t right.

“I’ve got this,” Dark promised, starting to remake the bed, with her hands instead of her aura.

In fact! It had just occurred to Illinois that her aura was completely absent, the red-blue after effects, the ringing echo.

She was just about to finish the bed when she collapsed, screaming bloody murder.

Illinois was next to her in an instant, trying to figure out what was wrong. She was screaming and her suit shirt was starting to darken with blood. Illinois at first didn’t move her, unsure of what had happened but after a bit he was able to stop the bleeding, grabbing the nearest article of clothing.

Dark didn’t bleed out but eventually the pain got too much and she just fell asleep. It was terrifying, Dark didn’t have a pulse and sometimes the Entity just didn’t breath, but Illinois had never seen Dark like this.

He was on the phone with one of Dark’s doctors, one Dark used for Illinois and the others but even when she came over she couldn’t find anything. There was no hole, no cut, not even bruising. But there was a lot of blood.

So Illinois waited by her bedside for Dark to wake up, calling Eric to tell him that the date would have to wait. Another couple of calls and Illinois made sure the network hadn’t noticed anything off and would continue to be running while Dark was out of commission.

Illinois also kept Bim and Yan out of the room. The Manor had righted itself back from whatever had happened while Dark had been acting weird. Wil came in and out, worried but sure she would wake up again.

At around seven at night she did.

“Sweetie?” Dark called out, and Illinois rushed over to her side.

“Mom?” Illinois tried.

“I can’t move,” she sounded terrified, tears started to fall from her eyes.

“I’m right here,” Illinois promised.

“Don’t tell your dad yet,” Dark pleaded. “He . . . I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

“I won’t let anything happen to you,” Illinois promised.

Dark gave a shadow of a smile, looking at him with love and awe, “I don’t know how you came from him. You’re so sweet, are you Wil’s, you have to be.”

Something in Illinois felt like he was being smothered, he couldn’t speak, his voice locked up in his throat for the first time since he’d watched his first adventuring partner die.

Before he could come up with something to comfort her, Dark’s eyes fluttered closed and she fell back into sleep . . . or more likely unconsciousness. Illinois wasn’t sure there was a difference with Dark’s situation.

She left Illinois to brew in his own suspicious thoughts.

This time she wasn’t out long, maybe fifteen minutes, and with it there was that familiar pitched ringing. Illinois held his breath.

“Ugh,” Dark groaned, reaching up to grab at where the blood had first started seeping from. “Where?”

“You okay?” Illinois asked.

Dark jumped, reflexively shifting back to look like his blue form, then he recognized Illinois and changed back. “Oh, it’s you. What happened?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t see you at work so I came looking for you,” Illinois warned. “You weren’t doing so well so I moved you onto the bed.”

Dark picked herself up a bit, looking at the clock, “How long have I been out of the office?”

“A couple hours, no one noticed,” Illinois promised.

She let out a sigh of relief, “At least something went right today.”

Wilford walked in and gasped when he saw Dark was half seated and ran at full speed towards her, jumping on the bed.

“Darky!” Wil shouted and Dark gave a surprised yelp. “How was your nap? I missed you.”

“Missed you too, Wil,” Dark smiled, patting Wil on the arm.

Reading the room, Illinois stood up, “Alright, I’ll step out for a couple minutes, call me if anything changes, alright?”

Dark stopped him, grabbing him by the arm, “Thank you.”

“Any time 엄마,” Illinois told her, Wil had rolled over to Dark’s side and was cuddling next to her.

“Dark,” she corrected.

“Not to me,” Illinois reminded, with all the confidence of a child who usually got away with things his siblings did not. Then with one last check if Dark could move, Illinois left.

He avoided Bim and Yan, there wasn’t any questions the two of them could answer for him. Illinois had known that Wil and Dark had been together for years, and he knew from scant hints he had been confided with, that Dark’s red soul had been with another before that. But he didn’t think that there had been a use for that crib before Bim.

But Illinois had to be sure that wasn’t the case. That there wasn’t a missing sibling out there, even if they might have died years before Illinois had been born. But they were someone worth looking for.

So he went to go find the only person who could possibly have old pre-network records of Egoton: Google.

Google was in the main warehouse, working on some device that wasn’t built enough for Illinois to even guess what it was.

“Why?” Google asked after Illinois asked for old records.

“Because I need that information for research,” Illinois answered. “Shouldn’t take more than about fifteen minutes, and then I’m out of your business.

Google let out a frustrated sigh and a holographic projected screen appeared in front of Google, angled towards Illinois. Illinois started to try and access Egoton’s census records.

“Egoton’s record before 1965 is circumstantial at best,” Google warned as Illinois tried to filter through the information.

“I just need to find records of anyone with the last name Barnum: B-A-R-N-U-M. Probably an adult in the 1920’s or 1930, married.”

Google went silent for a moment, his eyes flashing blue before he looked up, the screen in front of Illinois changed. “Zero individuals found with the last name  _ Barnum _ .”

Illinois sighed in frustration, “Come on Old Man. Try D-O-O-M.”

“Doom?” Google asked, just staring at him.

“Just do it,” Illinois grumbled, and when the android didn’t seem to be doing anything he added, “please.”

“Zero individuals found with the last name  _ Doom _ ,” Google informed.

“Course,” Illinois grumbled. “Why would he let any records of that survive? How about Doomstrum, D-O-O-M-S-T-R-U-M.”

“Still zero,” Google answered. “I do not know what you could possibly be looking for.”

Illinois was about ready to call it a loss, that he didn’t have any other information. Dark had covered his and Wil’s tracks fairly well. But then a name came into Illinois’s mind. Maybe from some distant memory of one of Wil’s lucid spells where he’d been drunk and jabbering on, or from some paper he had found. Or a name said in contempt when Dark thought no one had heard it.

“One more name and I’m done,” Illinois promised. “Markiplier. I think it’s a stage name. Try Iplier, or  _ I-plier _ ? However it’s pronounced. I-P-L-I-E-R.”

Google rolled his eyes but when quiet again, but this silence lasted longer. After about a minute or two Google brought forward a result. “It’s not in Egoton records but there is a mention of a Mark Iplier in the Los Angeles Evening Express. Date: April 13, 1929. The article is tucked back in the entertainment section, of sorts, the article details that a beloved Broadway actor and his wife are expecting a child.”

“Does it give the name of the kid?” Illinois asked, more hopeful than he should have been.

“No,” Google answered.

“That’s probably the only thing I’m going to get,” Illinois groaned.

“Why are you trying to look through Egoton’s destroyed records?” Google asked, artist to scan through the article. There were no pictures and nothing but human speculation. But it was a lead Illinois had been looking for.

“Just some questions I’ve had about how Egoton was before Dark showed up,” Illinois answered, and Google was more than convinced he was only giving him half the truth to throw the android off the story.

“Is that so?” Google asked, staring at him unblinkingly.

“Hey if you find out more, feel free to tell me,” Illinois shrugged and straightened his hat. “Anyways, if you don’t mind, I have to get back home. See yah Googs.”

Google made an angry hum and watched Illinois leave without even trying to stop him to ask more questions. The young man would head back to the Manor, but Google would start scouring for those names.

His interest was peaked.


	6. Every Frame a Story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s already been a rough year for Logan, feeling like his logic is failing him and that he needs to prove himself even more. But thankfully there are people here to help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Frame

Logan was in the communication room of the heroes’ base. He had been a little overeager to get back on duty, and having Virgil and Patton coming in and out helped calm his nerves.

Something he was desperate to prove wasn’t a problem, if only to prove it to himself. But now that he was back, he was starting to realize that it wasn’t the logical thing to do.

And that was the problem. Logan knew he was losing the one important thing he’d been desperate to hold onto with metaphorical tooth and nail: logic.

It’s what he was, it was what he symbolized. Logic, order, rationale. And if he didn’t have that, what was he?

Logan didn’t know and he desperately never wanted to find out. He didn’t understand emotions, he could barely decipher them in others, and to find out that he had some of his own was troubling.

It was a slow day, not much trouble except for petty crime, so Logan got to relax a bit. He was looking at some of the framed pictures that lined the walls. Almost all of them were of them in superhero-themed uniforms, except for one. It was an older photo of Thomas and his friends at some themed Halloween party, but instead of it being Roman or Patton, it was _Thomas_. Thomas, whole and undivided into his Sides, with many of his friends.

Getting up, Logan gently took the picture off the wall and brought it back to the chair.

A knock came at the door as it was automatically sliding open, Logan turned back to see it was Joan, “Hey big guy, what’s up?”

With a frustrated sigh, Logan admitted, “I was perhaps a little preemptive in returning to the base.”

“You need me to walk you back home, buddy?” Joan asked, concern in their voice.

“No, I should be fine,” Logan told them, “but if the situation worse I will take you or the others up on that offer.”

“Looking at the pictures?” Joan asked.

“Just reflecting on the past,” Logan admitted. “I worry that the more emotions I feel the less logical I become, and if that happens Thomas would never be able to return.”

Joan looked like they were carefully thinking about something, “You know that Thomas was an emotional person right? He thought emotions first.”

“Roman and Patton are certainly proof of that,” Logan agreed.

“You’ve all changed a lot,” Joan reminded. “You used to do nothing but study, Patton used to only chase dogs around the park, Virgil thought he was a bad guy. You’ve all changed, so I think that when you all manage to get Thomas back he’ll just be another fusion. Besides we’d all miss you guys.”

“Hell, most of the other heroes here never even met Thomas,” Joan reminded.

“Yes, that is very regretful,” Logan commented.

“Nothing we can do about that, I know that, and you know that,” Joan told him. “Even if you could instantly bring him back and nothing would change, can you imagine Roman and Remus having to share a space in the same mind?”

“If it was done before it can be done again, surely,” Logan determined, “but you’re right that will make it exceptionally difficult.”

“And what’s that thing you always tell Virgil and Patton when they’re having a tough time?” Joan insisted.

Logan let out a small smile. “Let go of what you can’t control, focus on something you can.”

“Thomas is gonna be okay,” Joan told him. “We’re not gonna let that fucking cannibal get to you again.”

“Thank you,” Logan commented, “I’m going to enjoy seeing him kept behind bars.”

“We all will,” Joan agreed, then they stood up. “Hey, let’s let Ollie take over and get you some fresh air, you probably need it.”

“My shift isn’t over yet,” Logan reminded firmly.

“You need some fresh air and we both know it, come on,” Joan told him. “The others will be fine for a couple minutes, I’ll let yellow submarine know on the way out.”

Logan rolled his eyes at the nickname for a deadly, super smart AI, but Oliver had certainly been called worse.

The two wound up waiting for Oliver, who was more than happy to come in early. Bing was out doing something and Oliver wasn’t busy with a project so he’d been looking for something to do.

Joan and Logan walked out, allowing Logan to collect his thoughts again.


	7. A Pretty Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien is the city’s mayor again, but Silver’s not happy. Not with having a demon controlling his town.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Mug

All in all Dark was feeling pretty proud of himself, even his red soul was content. The polls had closed and as Dark had predicted the town was so enraptured by _“Damien”,_ that he got a landslide victory.

Damien was mayor for a second term and it was clear the heroes were doing _nothing_ about it. None of them, Logan, Silver, Chase. None of them had stepped up with even the suspicion that Damien wasn’t what he pretended to be.

And Dark so happy, he was almost positive that he was starting to get overconfident.

Damien was in his office, holding a new mug Bim had given him. It was a white mug with _“I’M AN ANGEL”_ in blood red text, a halo hanging off one of the demon horns sprouting from either side of the text.

One of his assistants warned him on the intercom that Silver wanted to talk to him and Damien quickly gave the go ahead and the hero was walking in, Dark unable to contain a wide, Cheshire grin. “Hero.”

“Fuck you,” Silver told him.

“So angry,” Dark took a long sip of his coffee, letting out a long overdramatic sigh, not breaking eye contact with the hero as he did so.

“You’re the literal worst,” Silver snapped angrily. “ _You_ are everything that’s wrong with this fucking shithole. You were born here.”

“Egoton was always a shithole,” Dark reminded sharply. “It was that way _before_ you were born, and it will continue to be so _after_ you and your friends have ceased bothering me. I don’t understand why I continuously get blamed for taking advantage of the situation.”

“Not you,” Silver spat, pointing to him. “ _Him._ Your host. Get out of the way, I want to talk to him.”

“Excuse you,” Dark scoffed.

“I want to talk to your fucking host, I want to talk to the asshole letting you fuck our city like its name is Wilford Motherlovin’ Warfstache.”

Dark glared, his aura slamming the door closed and curling around the black and white themed hero. “Careful who you insult, hero.”

“Fine, I’ll lay off the madman, but I still want to talk to Damien,” Silver insisted.

“Absolutely not,” Dark leaned forward, a thin tendril of his aura idly stirring his coffee, then he lifted the mug to his mouth for another sip of coffee. “Get out of my office.”

“I’m not going anywhere ‘till I talk to the guy who’s letting you crawl under his skin and puppet his body,” Silver dared.

“He’s listening, hero,” Dark smiled, leaning back in his chair, fingers steepled against each other. “I’ll speak for him because quite frankly I don’t like you and I don’t trust you or your friends. I’m not about to lose a perfectly usable host.”

Silver let out a frustrated sigh, “Why?”

“Why what?” Dark asked. “You’re going to have to be more specific.”

“Why are you letting him use you?” Silver demanded.

“Hmm,” Dark answered, unable to keep a smile off his face. “Revenge, revenge, sad background, my father never loved me.”

“I’m talking to Damien, not you Dark,” Silver reminded.

“I don’t know what you want from me,” Dark made his eyes look more brown, more human. “Are you looking for something that will make everything make sense? Are you trying to save me? This town can’t be saved, you’re prolonging the inevitable.”

“This town _can_ be saved,” Silver proclaimed bravely, “and I’ll die proving it to you.”

“Famous last words,” Dark warned.

“They won’t be _my_ last words,” Silver promised. “Damien, I swear to you, I’ll prove this town is worth saving, that our home is worth fighting for.”

Dark looked at Silver with a chilled calm, “Time’s up hero.”

“The hell, it is,” Silver demanded, walking forward but Dark threw up a portal.

“If you don’t mind, Damien has work to do,” Dark told him. “This city won’t run itself.”

“One more question, and I’m gone for the day,” Silver told him.

Dark looked back at him, but didn’t say anything.

“Why pick Damien at all, you hate piloting bodies,” Silver asked.

Dark just smiled, trying to make the body look as human as possible, gesturing to his face, “Damien has a _very_ useful face, the city adores him. The media can’t stop showing his very pretty face on the news. The mayoral seat fits him like a well-worn glove.”

Even behind his mask, Dark could tell the hero was frustrated but he took a step towards the portal. The superhero paused, “Fight him Damien, you’re better than this.”

Then he left. Dark looking at the closing portal, thinking — not the first time — that things might have turned out differently if Silver had lived in Egoton back when Marc was plotting and planning their deaths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those wondering, Dark loves playing the Damien angle.


	8. Tag! You’re Gay!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Remus plays tag with the heroes, Marvin is not amused.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Run

Remus ran at Marvin at a full sprint, his deadly morning star in hand.

The magician barely had time to bring up his shield in time. His magic straining under the force of Remus’s swing and tentacles coming out of nowhere to attack.

“Fook off ye bastard,” Marvin ordered, pushing him back with magic, allowing Roman to fly in and slam into Remus at a speed that would have instantly killed someone who wasn’t either of them.

Remus had comical bursts of steam visually coming out of his nostrils like some green bull. “Hey, no fair. It’s my turn. You get them all the time.”

“What are you even doing?” Roman demanded.

The intrusive Side swung his morning star and Roman dove out of the way, finally pulling out of the way.

“Alright, I tried,” Roman shrugged, summoning his sword. “En garde!”

Remus summoned a cartoonishly designed circular bomb with a pre-lit wick that was already burning down. Without breaking eye contact with Roman, Remus tossed it behind him at Marvin who frantically used his shield that had been protecting him to shield the nearby area.

It exploded with more smoke than force. A ton of black smoke billowed out through the cracked shield.

Then Remus leaped right in front of Marvin and the magician placed to get hit in the face with a ball spiked steel club. But Remus simply tapped Marvin on the nose, and with a tone that would have been innocent if not for the fact it was Remus saying it, “Tag.”

And _then_ he slammed his morning star into Marvin’s side and sent him flying off to the side. “You’re gay.”

Then he let out a crazed but delighted cackle, jumping in place a bit.

Marvin was looking at him with complete confusion, he was bleeding and pretty sure he had a couple cracked ribs. “What? I mean, _yeah,_ but what does that have ta do wit’ anythin’?”

Remus motioned to the three of them, “We’re playing tag, but to make it gay tag, only we can play. Oh do you think Bim would play? He would play right, he hangs out with Anti and Wil so he can’t be that much of a rules lawyer.”

“No,” Marvin grunted, using his magic to patch up his injuries until he could get to Henrik to get taped up. “Yer all goin’ ta jail.”

“Hmm~” Remus hummed, his head tilted a bit like a neurotic, demented cockatoo. “Nope, don’t think so.”

“Princey, knock this fooker out,” Marvin ordered.

“I’m not playing tag with you,” Roman told his twin. “Never, ever. Not doing it.”

“Well I don’t want to be _“it”_ the whole time,” Remus pouted, huffing and swinging his morningstar around with an arm as if it was a stick he’d picked up from the park. “It’s not fair.”

“We never agree ta play tag, yeh just started brainin’ fookers with yer damn mace!” Marvin spat, holding his side. “Fook! That still hurts.”

“I remember telling you,” Remus accused. “You said yes in the morning.”

“You put toothpaste in my hair and then ran away cackling like a madman,” Roman spat. “You never explained the rules, just give up and come to jail.”

“You’ll never take me alive!” Remus said and ran off in a dead sprint.

Roman and Marvin looked at each other before they started chasing after him. The two heroes eventually losing him in the chaos he created and Marvin went to a not-so-happy Henrik who started patching him up.


	9. Green with Envy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Green goes after Bing. Green is jealous that Oliver gets all this time with Bing while he gets stuck with double duty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Green

Quite simply, it wasn’t fair.

Google was getting frustrated and without Oliver to dump some of his more  _ “unwanted” _ developments onto, he was getting angry. That made him push more work onto Green and Red and correct many of their settings to keep them in line, or kept the two of them monitored.

Honestly Green didn’t care about the humans, and Red actually cared even less. Oliver could terminate a million humans, zero, he could settle down in the middle of nowhere and keep a puppy farm. The amount of shits that Green cared about  _ what _ Oliver was doing was infinitesimally small.

But  _ where _ he was and  _ who _ he was with was a different matter entirely. Because Oliver wasn’t in the middle of nowhere, he wasn’t just spending time with some random human.

Ollie was with  _ Bing _ . He was with the heroes in their base with him, and Green hated it. He had slipped off behind Red and Green’s back and gone off with Bing.

So while Google was biding his time, Green was going off to find Bing, because he was either going to find him or dismantle Oliver, whichever opportunity crossed him first.

It took a couple of weeks of planning, using what he knew about Bing’s usual habits and places he liked to frequent to be able to get him alone.

Today was a lucky day, Bing wasn’t out with Oliver, he was walking down to the skate park when Green slammed into him, knocking him into the side of a wall.

Bing took one look at him, “You guys aren’t getting Ollie back.”

“Fuck Ollie,” Green spat angrily.

“Oh,  _ that’s _ the conversation we’re having,” Bing smiled and seemed to calm down dramatically.

“Ollie can stay locked up in the heroes’ garage as a glorified phone charger for all I care,” Green spat.

“Isn’t being angry Red’s standard setting?” Bing smiled, clearly not taking any of Green’s presence or attack seriously.

“Fuck Red too,” Green decided angrily.

“That’s the plan,” Bing joked, in response, he was knocked against the wall by Green.

“Did Google do another self purge again?” Bing smiled, trying to push Green off of him. “Dude, you usually get this angry after those.”

“What do you care?” Green spat, shoving him back against the wall again, “You have Ollie now.”

Bing’s expression shifted, “Wait, what?”

Green finally let off the pressure but took Bing and threw him forwards, almost into the street if Jackie had sped in to catch him.

“Gotcha,” Jackie reassured. “Let’s get this guy.”

“Nah, I got him,” Bing promised. “This is just his way of talking.

“He tried ta get yah run over,” Jackie reminded.

“I got him,” Bing insisted before turning his attention back to the infuriated android. “Hey Green, come on dude, just ‘cause Ollie’s working wit’ me doesn’t mean I don’t have time fer you.”

“I don’t want to hear that traitor’s fucking name,” Green threatened, his logo glowing even brighter.

The logo fired a laser blast at Bing, the orange android desperately tried to absorb the whole thing with his nanites but missed some of it. The blast thankfully missed hitting people, but that was because Green hadn’t been trying to hit them in the first place. Dust lightly coated the area and Bing was braced for a second but Green was gone.

The hostile android had taken the distraction and slipped away.

Bing looked around in frustration, had he known that Green was this possessive and jealous he would have done something ages ago. He was going to have to be careful with Oliver.

Jackie patted him on the shoulder, “ _ Ehh, _ yah’ll get ‘im next time.”

“Yeah,” Bing agreed. “I need to check on Ollie, make sure he’s okay.”

“Good luck,” Jackie told him and Bing headed back for the base as fast as he could.


	10. Bad Code

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anti has gotten bored and decided to mess with Google. It goes about as well as you would expect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Robot  
> It’s Anti’s birthday.

Anti was bored, so unbelievably, horribly bored.

Dark wasn’t even humoring him today, and he’d mess with his coffee, taken Bim out for a bit, and tried to stab him.

The Entity had long since stopped reacting to Anti stabbing him. He still got momentarily pissed but it had been almost fifteen years since Anti had gotten huge blown out reactions to it. Dark barely reacted to him besides frustration and an eye roll. Nothing that Anti did seemed to change it.

Honestly Anti blames that on Bim’s existence. Despite what he’d insisted, Dark had gotten soft since getting Bim and the other kids. He wasn’t fun for Anti to tease anymore.

Wil was busy, clearly his mind was ready to slip into an episode and everyone was more preoccupied in preparing for that and trying to cushion it as much as possible.

So Wilford was out, and once Dark heard that Wil was about to go into an episode he got protective of Bim and Yan so they didn’t get near him.

Anti was bored, and he was wandering around, just messing with Dark’s warehouses when Google was suddenly pulling him out of the wires in a rage.

“I am trying to get things done, you frustrating mess of mangled pixels!” Google screamed at him.

In his mind’s eye, Anti saw Dark, the type of person he’d been when they first met. Territorial, angry . . . and mostly importantly Google looked like he was still  _ fun _ .

As Google was trying to chew him out and yell at him, Anti could only smile.

The glitch demon sprung up, getting up close to Google but not physically touching him yet. “Hey, A.I Asimov, yah code an’ electronics all over?”

“Why would I tell you?” Google snapped angrily.

Anti swung out his fist to get some part of Google. The robot moved out of the way, his blue logo glowing fiercely.

“I will never understand why Dark allows you to infest the workspace, you are a plague and waste of space,” Google growled, trying to keep distance between Anti and himself.

“Aww, insult me like yah mean it,” Anti grinned. Then finally he lunged and with his claws he nicked the side of Google’s arm. The wound was glitching and spewing a dark grey liquid. The android’s blue logo was letting out some pulsing white glows that Anti didn’t know how to read, but he was sure it was bad.

“That looks nasty,” Anti smiled.

Google glared murderously at him, whatever he’d meant to say just came out as a garbled, glitchy mess. His defenses were working to fix the glitched code first.

Anti just started cackled, gleeful and finally getting someone to have a reaction to him today. “Yes!  _ Ahhhhh! _ I feel so  _ alive _ !”

“Feel this!” Google snarled, his voice processors finally starting to come back online, even though the words were still heavily distorted by his still glitched code.

Something hit Anti’s leg and he felt like it started to spread like a cloud. What started oozing out of his leg looked like a liquid but thousands of tiny grey machines started multiplying within his leg.

Anti swore and ported away, getting the little nuisances to stop multiplying was absolute hell and he knew that Google was somewhere cackling to himself.

The glitch demon would get his revenge in a couple hours, frying Green and Red with so many glitches it would take days for Google to get them back to normal.

But Anti would relish in his revenge and he’d admit he had more fun bothering Google than he expected to have that day.


	11. Who is the Strongest in the Land?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a bit of a debate in the Coalition. Who is the strongest? Silver’s superpower? Bob’s shields. Or Robbie’s magically infused muscles?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Strong
> 
> So, guess who saw the new Sanders Asides and already wants to make content? Me! Unfortunately for the plot I will have to wait until I can include the new pairing in so heads up on that.

For years there had been a question between the heroes.

Who was the strongest hero? Unlike with Jackie’s speed, Roman’s imagination-based powers, or the fact that Logan was unbeatable in trivia pursuit games; the _“strong”_ category had no clear first place winner.

If you asked anyone in the city there was only one name they gave: Silver. Mostly because he was able to lift cars and similarly heavy objects throw them an eyebrow-raising distance away.

Ask certain heroes like Joan and Logan or even King who were a bit more literal about the powers around them, and they gave a different answer: Bob.

Logan’s reasoning was simple: the veteran hero had impenetrable barriers. Blunt force objects, explosives, magical attacks, Dark’s aura, even Silver using his strength to rocket him across the fight like a huge pinball wasn’t enough to even crack the barrier. The only thing stopping the barrier was Bob’s stamina in maintaining said barrier.

Of course Marvin was one of the only people with a third opinion: Robbie. Before his zombification, for lack of a better term, Robbie had never really had a superpower. He had only some good sense — something interestingly hard to come by in the group — and he was a touch hardier than the average teenager. But _after_ Marvin had been using more and more spells to reverse the after effects of his slight decomposition, the result was Herculean strength and more human mannerisms.

Today one debate turned into another and once again Bob and Mark were going to settle the age old debate, and before anyone knew it most of the heroes were standing in the garage and Logan was helping to rig several sensors to take measurements of how hard Silver was punching and how hard Bob or his barriers were getting hit.

Henrik was of course naturally fretting around Robbie, fully objecting to Marvin using the young man to settle the debate.

“Nein! You vill do no such zing!” Henrik argued.

“Relax,” Iplier tapped him with the back of his hand, “J.J you’d tell us if anything happened right?”

J.J nodded and signed a quick _“yes”_ but was conspicuously not making his way to the betting pool to place a bet of his own. It kept Iplier from making his own since neither the time traveler nor the seer were making bets, they were sitting on either side of him, watching.

“Do you guys know who to bet on?” Dr. Iplier asked them.

“Of course the Host knows who will win,” the seer grinned between his narrations.

J.J gave a sign that the Host did his best to translate, _“No bet on first attempt,”_ J.J warned him.

“I’ll ask you next time then,” Iplier joked, smiling. “We’ll make bank on it.”

Then the Host pulled a jar out that had two five dollar bills in it, a tapped note in Iplier’s handwriting read on the front: _“TIE”_. Each of the notes had a rolled up piece of paper that had the name of the person who had placed the bet and how much they placed. There was a huge grin on his face, “The Host suggests Iplier go and place his bet on the table.”

J.J shrugged and slipped a five into Iplier’s hand, his name tag wrapped around it. Thankfully the bulk of the group was too busy arguing to notice what was obviously the Host’s bet going up. But Virgil who was close by saw that Iplier was trying to sneak the jar up. Iplier then snuck back and Virgil carefully slipped his bet from Bob’s jar, which he had only chosen because Logan had placed a bet there, to the Tie jar. Then he went back to sitting a safe distance away. _“A safe distance”_ that would eventually turn into sitting next to Iplier.

“Fuck ‘em up Robbie!” Ethan cheered from where he was standing.

Robbie gave a huge, warm smile.

“Aren’t you supposed to be on my team?” Mark chuckled, giving his former apprentice a fake-offended gasp.

Ethan just laughed, his contagious giggling undercutting any actual vitriol that could have been in the words, “No, _hahahah_! Fuck you.”

Bob laughed, “Ooooh! He got you good!”

Mark rolled his eyes and lightly pushed him, “Come on, let’s go.”

Roman cleared his throat, he was in a huge puffy tutu that was white and red with glitter dusting it. He was in a tight red and white leotard with golden accents to it that were reminiscent of his usual outfit, along with a pair of white footed pants. “Well let’s begin, my bet won’t win itself.”

“Your wager was placed by bribery with cookies, compounding your already unsound logic,” Logan reminded him.

“Oh hush, nerdy Wolverine,” Roman ordered, and held an arm up. “Okay, Round 1: Silver Shepherd v. Gatling, to the victor go . . . the victory.”

“Smooth, Princey,” Virgil snickered.

Roman stuck out his tongue at Virgil and the anxious Side just snickered and rolled his eyes. “Well we have other rounds.”

The creative Side cleared his throat before announcing, “Ready. Set. Go!”

Roman brought his hand down as he said that last word. Mark shot off at full speed, too fast for most of the heroes to follow with their own eyes.

Bob brought up a barrier in time and the air around the other heroes popped most of their ears. Virgil whimpered in pain a bit and scooted over to get closer to Iplier.

Silver repeatedly flew around to get spread. The barriers never broke and Silver kept up the onslaught for another couple minutes before the wear and strain started to show on Bob’s face.

Usually in an actual fight the other heroes would have picked up the slack so Bob could hunker into his barriers and get a breather to grab his second wind. But this wasn’t a normal fight, it was a duel and the fight started to wear down on him.

The instant Silver saw it, he started taunting his friend. “What’s the matter, getting tired there?”

“How about you shut up, asshole!” Bob shouted and as Silver was racing forward again, he extended out the barrier and Silver wasn’t as braced as he should have been and slammed into it face-first, breaking his nose.

The barrier extended out, taxing more of Bob’s strength than he expected. The shield flickered and Silver noticed it immediately and struck, slamming into the barrier again and Bob’s concentration slipped, the barrier flickered again just long enough for Silver to speed through and knock Bob to the ground, pinning him in place.

Mark had a huge, smug smile on his face, “ _Hah!_ I win.”

Bob groaned, “Fuck!”

“Inconclusive,” Logan huffed. “The barriers were never broken.”

“But he was defeated all the same,” Host announced. “The Host doubts that Silver’s current opponent could get back on his feet to fight Silver so soon.”

“You didn’t even make a bet,” Mark shouted at him, catching his breath a little.

But at the Host’s huge smile, Silver looked back at Jackie who was now by the table, “Hey, what _was_ his bet, cause that smile says he made one.”

“I dunno,” Jackie shrugged, “I stepped away to grab a coffee.”

“The Host was secretive about his bet because only five people would have voted against him,” the Host said.

“Of course we wouldn’t have,” Ethan agreed loudly. “You know what’s gonna happen.”

“But where would the Host get his entertainment from?” The Host smiled, trying to sound hurt but it didn’t work at all.

“You asshole,” Bob smiled. “Kay, Silv, you win.”

“Hey! That’s my job!” Roman reminded indignantly.

“Wooooo! Yeah, I’m the best, fucking suck it!” Mark shouted at Bob, talking right over Roman which made the Side even angrier, floating off the ground for a bit.

Bob shoved him a bit, sending him farther than if Mark had been standing like a normal person. “Ugh, you are the worst sometimes.”

Then Bob stepped aside and Robbie came to stand opposite Silver. And here was where Mark made his first mistake. He looked at Robbie, at the former apprentice he had helped train, and tried to figure out how to beat Robbie without hurting him.

Roman announced how, and Silver moved first. He flew towards Robbie but instead of knocking him over, the young man grabbed him by the arm and used Silver’s momentum to toss him to the side and make him slammed into the wall behind the zombie.

Henrik and Marvin dove out of the way, and Mark stared at Robbie with surprise.

“Yeah, get ‘im,” Marvin cheered after a moment’s shock.

“Alright, fine then,” Mark huffed out, deciding that he could afford to be a little rougher with him. Much to Henrik’s mounting horror, Mark began to try with more effort to pin Robbie down, but Mark’s earlier round with Bob and the fact that he’d been wasting time going easy on him for the first half of the fight.

So when Mark came flying towards him, trying to get around the back to pin Robbie down but the ensuing struggle looked more like a wrestling match and ended with Robbie kinda hugging Mark’s arms to his side and the superhero just floating in the air looking like a piece of board.

“Heya,” Bob smiled at Mark, “having fun there, buddy?”

“Shut up,” Silver tried to wiggle free but Robbie just hugged him harder, a smile on his face.

After about a solid minute, he let out a frustrated growl and just floated there in an angry huff. “How? Marvin what have you done to this guy?”

“That sounds like he gave up,” Marvin grinned, looking at Logan who looked thoroughly upset and put out. “Victory right?”

“No!” Silver called, struggling a bit more. “I’m not giving up.”

Then he admitted, “Yeah . . . fine.”

“Robbie win?” Robbie smiled at Marvin.

“Sure did kid,” Marvin cheered.

“Yay!” Robbie let go of Mark and he just floated there for a bit, pouting a little.

He did float out of range so Bob, hopped up on an energy drink and getting a little bit of a rest, could take his place. He smiled as he put out a little bit of a barrier. Bob was bracing for a hard hit like he usually was with Silver but when Roman called _“Go”_ and Robbie slammed his shoulder against the barrier, Bob barely felt it.

Bob was used to faster heroes, and having a tanky type of fighting style, by necessity with his powers, he was unused to defending against that.

But Robbie wasn’t a fast fighter, strong? Absolutely. However he wasn’t even half as fast as Mark and Bob just rested his elbow against the barrier and leaned against it. It had been a hot minute since he’d fought someone he had enough time to rest with.

Mark and Wade were the first ones to realize what was going on.

“Well shit,” Wade said. “He’s not getting through that.”

“He could!” Marvin promised defiantly.

Wade gave Marvin a look, “You know he’s not.”

“Come on, he hits hard enough to do more than that,” Mark defended, if only to salvage his own wounded pride.

“Oh yeah, I feel something,” Bob agreed. “It’s just not fast enough.”

“He was going faster against Silver,” Marvin cut in. “I call a do over.”

“No! No! If I got tired after Gatling,” Mark called out, “that counts.”

“But that means it’s a tie,” Bob spoke up. “We can’t have a tie.”

“But oh yes, the heroes can,” the Host smiled.

“Yah weren’t e’en bettin’!” Marvin shouted at them.

“But yet the Host always wins,” the Host smiled, J.J smiled as well.

“So do we win?” Virgil asked hesitantly.

“Hey,” Logan turned to Virgil, “you placed a bet at the same time has me for Bob.”

“I changed it,” Virgil whispered, already pulling his hoodie up a bit higher.

“You changed your vote because you were aware of a more likely outcome,” Logan realized. “I applaud your insight.”

Virgil smiled a bit and the winnings were distributed amongst the four winners, J.J leaving this timeline as it was. Logan, Bob, Marvin, and Mark continued to debate between each other who would have won in an _“actual fight”_ after the Host used his voice to bring in a bunch of donuts to distract the heroes from the fact that he had basically got away with the bulk of the winnings . . . again.


	12. High Flying Adventure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eric and Illinois go on another adventure, and Illinois finds something a bit more valuable than gold or jewels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Cloud

Interestingly enough, Eric hadn’t been aware that he was afraid of heights. But he was.

Eric and Illinois had snuck out of the city again to go on a little adventure. An adventure to a city that Eric had been too busy watching Illinois as he was explaining the name and history of the place. Seeing Illinois talking about something he loved was always so enthralling.

Then they stepped into a hot air balloon and Eric realized they were taking off the ground, it wasn’t until they got up a certain height that Eric understood why Illinois insisted he bring a sweater. It got colder the higher up they got, the sparse, thin cloud line misting over them.

Illinois was chuckling next to him as Eric screwed his eyes shut and held onto the explorer. “You’re fine sweetheart, I got us.”

The adventurer hadn’t intended the effect of bringing Eric up into the clouds to be that Eric had grabbed onto him, but he certainly wasn’t complaining. However he hugged his shy boyfriend back, “ _Dulcito,_ look at me.”

Eric peeked open his eyes to look up at Illinois.

“How can I help you _dulcito_?” Illinois asked. “You wanna get back on the ground?”

“Don’t you need to be up here?” Eric whimpered.

“Not for much longer, we’ll be on the ground soon,” the adventurer maneuvered so that he could pull on a pair of fire-resistant gloves and take out an almost clear golden orange gemstone. One of his vast collection, sacrificed for a nobler cause.

Illinois managed to convince Eric to sit in the basket so he couldn’t see the ground as Illinois tried to do the ritual almost blindfolded. The last adventuring party had to wait five whole years to get the phase of the sun right. It resulted in the two lead explorers marrying some of the locals and almost giving up to settle down in the area before they were able to actually perform the ritual.

Thankfully with aerial technology, they could skip all that uncertain planning. Illinois took out a laser pointer and tried to angle it, hoping that by some miracle that he was _lucky_ enough to get the angle right.

Even with his normally abnormal luck it took over five minutes to get the angle right. The gem caught fire and disintegrated.

Only then did Illinois start their decent back towards the ground.

“We-We’re go-ing d-own?” Eric looked up at Illinois with huge eyes.

“Yeah, we just—” Illinois smiled and a strong gust of wind hit them, causing Illinois to need to fight to get the balloon under control and back towards the ground.

Eric was the first to leap out of the basket and jump towards the ground as Illinois and another attendant helped secure the balloon down and then Illinois pulled Eric away as another tourist group was scheduled to get into the balloon.

Illinois chuckled a bit when Eric held onto his arm as they walked into a nearby forest. “You sure you’re okay.”

The more timid young man shook his head, “H-H-appy to be on the gr-ound.”

“Got it, got,” Illinois laughed. “No more balloon trips.”

“Y-Yo-ou’re being mean,” Eric complained angrily.

With another chuckle, Illinois stopped to kiss Eric on the top of his head before leading him into the forest, Eric still holding onto his arm.

Illinois lead them deep into the woods where there was a clearing where the ground normal sat with dirt, grass and brush, but in the spread out roots of one of the trees a hole had ripped open in the ground and showed a passageway.

Quickly Illinois tossed down some rocks he’d collected on their walk over before jumping down and then helping Eric down.

Unlike every other excavation he’d ever done, the tunnel led into a small alcove that had a tall stone box that showed every damage, as if something inhuman had clawed and punched at the box. Almost like the creature had been trying to get something out. There were scorch marks against the walls were someone had been attacked and scorched and the wall had been protected from the elements.

But when Illinois walked up to it he could easily pull the empty box open to examine it.

“We’re t-too late?” Eric stammered.

“Oh yeah,” Illinois told him. “Over a hundred years too late. Big expedition team came in to try and deal with a demon that reportedly had impersonated a local spirit, once things were explained to them they were happy to see it gone.”

“Oh, _umm,_ okay,” Eric trailed off, looking nervously at the marks. “So, _uh,_ what made the, _uh,_ marks, there’s n-none inside.”

“So far I don’t think that means anything big,” Illinois promised. “They got the big scary demon out of the area, never bothered the village again. Wait, no, technically not true but he wasn’t intending to harm this place, I don’t think he even remembers this city exists.”

Eric went quiet as Illinois took some pictures, but blushed madly when the adventurer snapped a couple images of Eric and immediately sent them to another file.

“Ills,” Eric complained.

“If my phone’s not full of pictures of your lovely face, sweetie, then I gotta take more,” Illinois grinned.

“Stop it!” Eric’s face was beet red, grabbing onto the front of Illinois’s shirt.

Illinois just laughed before he inclined his head a bit, “Only if you believe me.”

Eric’s smile dropped, and he looked away, “C-Come on, Illy.”

“It’s true,” Illinois reminded and reached over to inspect the inside of the box. Then he took out a necklace, “Okay, let’s dig up some secrets.”

Just watching, Eric took a step back and after a few hushed words in a language that Eric didn’t understand and the whole room exploded. There were almost like flashes of color. Illinois helped Eric out of the hole and they saw a red energy flash, it had a humanoid shape with a black energy mass around it. There were grey figures advancing on them, one of them had light swirls of colors around him and a book in his hand. Suddenly the black mass began shaking and the red figure disappeared. The man with the book had something that made his hand flash in and out of sight. Then the cloud seemed to get sucked into what looked like a large urn and the grey figures moved into the hole. Not too long after the red figure came back and followed the hole.

Illinois said something and the auras dissipated. “Yeah I know how that ends. I was looking for this adventuring group, I needed to make sure it was them.”

“Is it them?” Eric asked.

“Oh yeah,” Illinois smiled and figured that there was just an empty cave with no artifact or anything to steal beside an empty stone box. He figured that if anyone could get it out in the first place when it had nothing to do with the landscape or history, they deserved to have it. “Let’s get you back to town.”

Eric let the conversation drift to another topic and for Illinois take them back to town. He was mostly talking about the local delicacies and some street performers. While Eric was watching a movie that night and Illinois stepped out for what he promised would be ten minutes, and it turned into thirty and he walked back in with a smile and apologized for it taking so long.

Illinois took them to what seemed like a pub, they were talking and ordering food and then when someone Illinois was waiting for he got up to go stand by the bar.

“ _Ahh,_ Mr. Philly,” the man smiled as he walked up. “Still here I see.”

“Course, Sig,” Illinois smiled. “You have my report?”

“Yes, if you have my payment, it was hell-a-half digging them out,” he warned.

“A word of warning,” the man leaned closer. “I’m not sure your boss would want you bringing these guys back to his place.”

“Thanks,” Illinois evaded.

Quickly the notebook and money were exchanged and the man left to grab himself a drink as Illinois walked back over to the table where Eric was sitting. It was a nice, guarded place, Illinois was proud that his boyfriend had learned a lot from him.

They ordered something to eat and Illinois hunkered down to read the journal, setting aside a few old pictures to examine them later as he read the accounts of the adventurer who went around _“witch hunting”_ and that term got an eye roll out of Illinois.

Eric was flipping through the pictures and smiled, “ _Aww,_ wh-what a cute little kid.”

Illinois looked over to see a team of twenty men and almost right in the center was what looked like a three-year-old boy. He had an oversized safari hat that matched the other men, except he had a huge smile plastered to his face. The man standing next to him had a rather stern expression with a bushy mustache.

Taking the photo he saw the picture was dated _1894, winter_. “Guess he is,” Illinois agreed, already having a bit of a suspicion who the kid was.

Illinois smiled, “Hey, _dulcito,_ wanna hear a secret?”

“S-Sure?” Eric said uneasily.

The adventurer pointed to the small kid, “That is a very young Warfstache.”

“No,” Eric gasped, leaning in. “Bu-But he’s s-so small. Is Dark in th-the picture?”

Illinois scanned back over the picture, “Nah, don’t think so.”

Eric thought for a second, “Are there any baby pi-pictures of D-ark?”

“Ehh, there’s probably a cave wall somewhere with some black paint on it,” Illinois joked.

They ate their food, went back to their hotel and after sleeping in a bit, started heading back to Egoton. Illinois reading through the journal and finding some pretty interesting spells. Each one for containing spirits and demons, and Illinois knew that Dark would want to take a look at that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Scene I sadly had to cut:  
> Wilford and Actor Mark’s father: Okay so we’ve got the dangerous demons that we’ve been trying to track down for years, team. Bad news, that vase we put it in won’t hold the powerful one. So I’m asking for some suggestions.  
> Damien and Celine’s father: we could bind it to your house. That gaudy thing should contain it.  
> Wilford and Actor Mark’s father: No I— how dare you! First off, me and my family live there. Second, I am not binding a demon to a house. My very well designed and decorated mansion.  
> Damien and Celine’s father: we can either bind it to your house or it’ll escape from mine with all my magical artifacts.  
> Wilford and Actor Mark’s father: shit!  
> (And then they put the Entity in the House)


	13. Happy Anniversary!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dark is not having a good day, everything seems to be going wrong and even the body he’s in is trying to fight against him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: door  
> You think I forgot about the Who Killed Markiplier anniversary? No! I just didn’t want it to compete with Anti’s birthday. (I used an idea from an anon on tumblr in this fic, it was about Dark and Wil’s date being interrupted by a hero and that hero feeling bad).

Dark should have known from the moment he tried to get up, it was going to be one of those days.

The awful day began with a nightmare. It wasn’t the typical reliving of watching Marc hit the ground, or the reoccurring monster of a nightmare where Wilford found out what he really was and his body chose to stop work and he could only watch him walk away from him.

No, this time Dark was standing in front of a door, one that seemed to be bulging and having some monster beating against it. Everything that reminded Dark about how small and uncomfortable this form was. How ill-fitting it had been when the Entity had finally made its desperate escape from the House.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Dark shouted at the door. “I fit.”

There was a loud scream that sounded just like Dark, Celine, and Damien.

_“I don’t fit.”_

_“He’ll find out.”_

_“They’ll find out.”_

Dark screamed and snarled back and the door splintered.

And then he woke up in bed, staring at the ceiling and aware of the fact that every inch of his body was in pain. To make matters worse the body that Dark was inhabiting suddenly remembered it was dead, that it had been ripped away from and stolen from its rightful owner.

The Entity was paralyzed by pain and felt blood pool around his stomach. His pride, and a dab of fear, kept him from reaching out to the body next to him.

It took a long time to get his pain under control and he finally did reach out to Wilford, calling out to the man awake. He was huffy and disgruntled at first, until he looked over and saw Dark and immediately dash off to get something to help clean him up.

After the bleeding had stopped and everything was clean, Dark got a little bit of sleep. But while the pain had completely gone away, he found he had an awful migraine.

Regrettably he was forced to admit defeat and call in sick from Damien’s job. He could only deal with one circus today and his Network took priority.

Of course nothing went right, Yan managed to break the best coffee maker in the building, the one Dark always used. Illinois was gone, he was taking care of some business outside the city, and he knew Wil was up to something by the way his aura kept creeping back towards him but the madman himself never showed up. Almost like he was checking on his location to be sure Dark hadn’t noticed something.

Problem after problem kept cropping up and Dark’s migraine was almost a shrill whistle in his brain. It was making his red and blue souls angry and that compounded the pain even more as their screams rattled around in Dark’s skull. He wanted the whole world to die and ordered Ed and Google to stay away from him if they didn’t want to die.

Then, barely a minute from the time Dark was set to leave, Wilford showed up. Loud and all bright smiles and looking like he was about to distract Dark from finding out about whatever he had broken or killed.

“Darky, I have a surprise for you,” Wilford said in a sing-song tone, a bouquet of black tulips behind his back.

“Wilford, dammit!” Dark slammed his aura like a fist on his desk. “I cannot deal witth anymore fucking bullshit today! What did you do?”

“I,” Wilford and the flowers he’d conjured wilted a little. “I didn’t do anything, I was just bringing you something.”

Dark felt bad for snapping and tried to reign in that boiling rage that he’d been using to distract himself from the constant pain, curling his hands into fists. “Alright, what is it?”

Wil gave a huge smile and seemed to perk right up, pulling the flowers behind his back. They looked pristine and beautiful. “Happy anniversary, Darkling. I remembered this time.”

Internally in his mind, Dark’s screams were more than from pain. This wasn’t the day that Wil and Dark had met in Egoton again after Dark began taking over the city and Wilford was little more than a public menace. It was the first time Dark and Wil had met in the Manor . . . as William began to go mad.

But Dark mentally caught up, forcing the body he was in to stand up and accept the flowers. “Oh, thank you.”

Dark reached into the Void for the gift he’d planned to give him on their anniversary but he’d think of something new to give him on that day. It’s not like Wilford kept track of the days after all.

Holding out the box, Dark said, “Happy anniversary, my dear.”

Wilford jumped a bit in excitement and opened the gift to see a set of throwing daggers engraved with Wilford’s name and mustache. The hilt had something that Wil could spin and turn. Which he immediately started doing. “I love it.”

His eyes seemed to glimmer, “We should go out for a stroll. It’s getting late out and I love the way the moon hits your eyes.”

Dark meant to say no, that he was tired, his body hurt, but he looked at Wilford and decided that he didn’t want the man to step away from him. “Sure.”

“Excellent, let’s go,” Wilford grinned, offering out his arm.

“Let me clean myself up,” Dark evaded, placing the flowers in a vase he kept in the office in case Wilford strolled in with a gift or bribe for Dark. “Would you be a gentleman and get the door for me?”

Wilford used his aura to rip a hole in reality that led right into the master bedroom’s en-suite bathroom. Dark strolled through and shut the portal behind himself. The Entity tried to collect his thoughts and compose himself.

Dark gripped onto the door, leaning against it as he tried to will his stolen body to obey him. Dark glared into the mirror, staring at his stolen body. “You are mine now, and you will obey me.”

He continued to stare at _“his”_ reflection and growled, “We are going to have a nice night with Wilford or I will break more of you in the process. Y/N is not getting you back.”

Slowly the pain receded to what Dark considered a manageable level. He forced his own aura into compliance as he checked his eyeliner and makeup, reapplying it as needed. Then he magically shifted into a new suit and tie. Once his self-investigation was passed, not a hair out of place to betray his still raging migraine, Dark opened up a portal to his office and back to Wilford who just smiled at him and Dark felt pretty successful. He took Wilford’s offered arm and Wilford led them out by portal into the city.

To what was supposed to be a nice walk, and then Dark promised himself he’d go home and have an early night.

But it didn’t happen.

None of it happened.

At first it was alright, peaceful. Wilford and Dark were walking around town as Wilford told Dark about his day. All of it was extremely exaggerated. He was sure that if Wilford had managed to find time to slip away and punch tigers in the Amazon — a creature that didn’t even live on that continent — Dark would have heard about it. But seeing Wilford smiling was brightening up Dark’s mood considerably. It was managing to drive the pain away. Dark didn’t know how it was possible but the world was just more bearable with him around.

Then Silver appeared, he flew in and slammed into Dark, the Entity barely able to get his aura up in time to shield him from the impact.

Wilford tried to grab Dark as he was ripped off his arm but wasn’t fast enough.

Dark’s body’s back protested the hit when he slammed against a building wall.

“Are you mad‽” Dark roared.

“Darkling!” Wil shouted out but he was cut off by Marvin who was just throwing spells at him to keep him occupied.

“No, I’m not letting you pull this, what are you up to,” Silver ordered.

Dark anger was boiling and now that his object of attention wasn’t Wilford or the kids, or someone of value to him, he lashed out at Silver, screaming in rage at him.

All the anger and pain that had been building up lashed out at the hero. He lunged at Silver and completely missed in the fight that Wilford was getting farther away from him, and that his own reserves were drying up much faster than expected.

Until finally the stolen, defiant, overtaxed body simply gave up. Dark felt a new, fresh, white hot pain lace up his nerves until it hit something in him and suddenly everything went black. His body had shut down on him. Forcing him to take the rest he should have taken hours ago.

Silver, for his part, stopped fighting when Dark suddenly locked up and dropped to the ground. At first he thought it was an act of some kind. He’d never seen Dark play the defenseless unconscious victim but after a minute or two he didn’t get up. He was just laying there. His aura nowhere in sight and the ringing gone.

So he ventured closer.

Nothing.

Silver tapped Dark on the shoulder, trying to wake him up.

Still nothing.

Tentatively Silver picked Dark up, finding that he was a lot lighter than he expected, but wasn’t sure if that was his super strength or not.

Even this didn’t rouse Dark from whatever happened.

Alarmed and concerned about whatever could make a force of nature, a demon as powerful as Dark sudden collapse with no warning, Silver called an immediate retreat. Whoever was dealing with the massive museum robbery five blocks over could keep fighting it but he wanted this area evacuated. Then he took off for the police station. They’d deal with this one step at a time.

To say Abe and the other officers were shocked when Silver flew in with Dark was an understatement. But Silver didn’t stop to answer questions until they’d placed Dark in a magic-proof cell. It allowed nothing magical-related in or out once the doors were locked. Marvin had improved it since their last break out and Silver carefully placed Dark’s unconscious body — or Silver supposed it was actually Damien’s since that’s what he had been led to believe — on the cot. He was worried when he couldn’t feel a pulse or feel Damien breathing and Abe immediately tried to do compressions.

Marvin, when he arrived, successfully tricking Wil into going somewhere else to bide them some time, was ecstatic to find Dark in jail but less so when he found them trying to revive the Entity.

Silver demanded Marvin check to see if Damien was still in there and after a test with a white feather that turned a vibrant almost cyan blue, the three of them figured that the lack of a heartbeat or a pulse was just a dark thing. That if Damien was fine, it was alright.

Abe then locked up the cell and the whole thing buzzed with magic. For the next five minutes Dark didn’t move and everyone just waited with bated breath as Silver gave his report and slowly the situation became clear.

As it turned out, Dark and Wilford had absolutely nothing to do with the robbery. They were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and Silver felt a little bad.

Granted Dark deserved to get his manipulative ass thrown in jail. He was a murderer, had stolen and lied before. He had successfully managed to corrupt every head of office the city’s government had ever had, countless people were in Dark’s back pocket. He’d destroyed people’s lives without batting an eye and mostly likely when he got out he would do so again. But this situation didn’t sit right with him.

Silver had attacked Dark unprovoked and something about this victory felt cheated. Like this victory hadn’t been either of their doing.

The hero noticed the grey staticky aura that normal clung to things Dark touched was leeching off his suit, revealing that instead of a black suit he had a very dark blue suit with matching pants and tie. Silver just stared at the suit, wondering if Dark’s suit had ever been black and he’d been playing a massive trick on them.

Three hours after closing the cell, Silver walked back in to check on Dark and saw the demon starting to pick himself up off the cot. He looked rough.

The hero rushed, “Fuck, Dark, you okay?”

Dark sat up and silently glared at Silver for a second before the chair that was bolted to ground was ripped off by Dark’s aura and thrown at the cell wall in Silver’s direction.

“Right, stupid question, sorry,” Silver apologized. “Hey so, there was a bit of a misunderstanding. Turns out you two had nothing to do with that robbery so we took that off your record.”

“So you’ll let me go?” Dark attempted.

“Oh fuck no,” Silver told him. “Between all the corruption and murder, and just being the fucking worst; we have enough to put you away for all of time.”

“Really?” Dark seemed to be in a slightly better mood than during their fight. “What time is it?”

“Bout 11, at night,” Silver told him. “Hey you want me to grab you a coffee, you look like you could use one.”

“Yes, thank you,” Dark told him, leaning back against the wall with his eyes closed. He seemed to be relaxing.

“How do you take it?” Silver asked.

Dark didn’t open his eyes, “No cream, two sugars.”

“You don’t take it completely black,” Silver asked, surprised.

Dark scoffed, “No.”

“Huh, I’ve been fighting you for so long, I feel like I should have known that,” Silver thought out loud.

The Entity didn’t give a response of how it was rightfully none of Silver’s business how Dark took his coffee. Silver left and Dark told the time not to investigate his cell but to relax. A bit. His nap had actually brought his migraine down to a dull buzz and Dark could deal with that. He could think. Most of the pain had left his body except for the slight neck, back and stomach pain that usually accompanied the body he was in.

Silver came back after a bit with a coffee and a bottle of water for him. “Hey so if you two had nothing to do with that heist, what were you doing?”

Dark’s first impression was to ask: _“what heist?”_ But he figured that would give away the fact that Dark didn’t know what was going on all day. So he just answered, “It _was_ anniversary night before you two showed up.”

“Oh,” Silver opened the little tray and slid the coffee onto the little table they kept just so no hands came in or out of the cell and disrupted the magical barrier. “Sorry about the date.”

Dark finally stood up, straightening out his suit jacket and sweeping his bangs back. He waved Silver off as he grabbed the cup, the cell bars between them as Dark swirled the coffee with his aura and took a sip. “Don’t be, I should have insisted staying indoors, Enjoy this victory, you won’t get another.”

“Marv’s gonna be riding this high for ages,” Silver warned.

“I’m sure,” Dark agreed in-between sips as he was still drinking his coffee.

“Hey, while I’ve got you here, can I ask you something?” Silver said.

“What, not going to pretend this will keep me?” Dark grinned as he gestured with the cup around the cell.

“Nah,” Silver shook his head, “I’ll come in tomorrow and you’ll be gone. Either you’ll pay someone off or you’ll find some other way out.” 

“Hmmm,” Dark smiled and downed the last of his coffee, setting it down on the table. He sat down on the remaining space, resting an ankle up on his knee and looking very much like a caged tiger in a zoo. And the zoo only had ten-foot walls. “Ask away then, hero.”

“Why did you get kids,” Silver asked, “never took you for the familial-settle-down type.”

“I’m not and I’d kill you to maintain it,” Dark warned.

“Right, right,” Silver said, not believing it for a second. “But still you raised six kids. _Six_ whole ankle biters with _Wilford Motherluvin’ Warfstache_. That just seems like something you planned.”

“The first one, absolutely not,” Dark admitted, “the next five, yes.”

“So how bad was it? Cause the stories I’ve heard sound ridiculous,” Silver chuckled. “Yancy said that Host filled a super soaker with hydrochloric acid once.”

“Ughhh!” Dark rolled his eyes, leaning back a bit. “Arthur was impossible, even more so when he started getting his powers. Illinois and Arthur always had this ridiculous rivalry I never understood.”

“Sounds like you two never had a dull moment,” Silver commented.

Dark made an amused little huff, “I wish I had known that your time traveler wasn’t as powerful as I had thought, I would have raised them differently. But there’s little point in that now.”

“Like how?” Silver crossed his arm in front of him.

“Let them see and experience more of the world. Kay and Bim would have enjoyed it.” Dark sighed. “That is my only true regret, not taking the time to do more research. I always assume the worst with your insane powers.”

“You raised a teenage daughter who can summon weapons, and only weapons out of thin air,” Silver reminded. “I can fly and lift stuff, which of us is the weird one.”

“You obviously,” Dark told him.

“I get it,” Silver joked, “you’re biased, she’s the perfect princess. I get it.”

“I always felt bad for Yan,” Dark admitted. “House full of boys, she always wanted a little sister when she was a child.”

“If you got the kids in the first place, what’s one more?” Silver asked.

Dark almost made a scoffing laughing sound, “A seventh one? We could barely handle six, are you insane?”

Silver just laughed at that, “Me? I’m the crazy one? I’m not the one who settled down with Wilford fucking Warfstache.”

“I always knew Wil would make a good father, even though he does get careless at times,” Dark told him. “Bim convinced me of that.”

Silver quiet for a little bit, “You know you’re a devious asshole and a complete bastard, and Wil is butt-fuck insane, but I’m actually really happy to know that you two actually took care of those kids. When I first figured out about Bim and King I was pissed and scared; but despite the lengthy criminal records, you didn’t do half bad.”

Dark didn’t like the fluttering emotion in his chest, so he scoffed and looked away, “If you’re quite done, I think I’ll take another nap before I leave. Keep your magician away if he wants to keep his hands.”

“Didn’t you just down a whole coffee?” Silver pointed out.

“Unlike you lower mortals, I don’t need the caffeine, I just like the coffee,” Dark told him and walked over to the cot and laid down. “Now go away.”

“Asshole,” Silver rolled his eyes but with a quick goodbye he let Dark be. Silver went to go talk to Abe and Marvin and during that time there was an alarm that went off and Silver rushed with Marvin to find the door of the cell had heavy damage, as if something had come underneath to dislodge the door and disrupt the spells keeping the cell locked down. There was already a Void portal closing in the cell as they raced in.

Marvin swore at losing Dark but Silver helped fix the door and then went home to get some rest. It was a long day.

“And there we go,” Wil smiled as he laid Dark down in the bed. Dark was in his pajamas and Wilford was gently combing his hands through Dark’s hair, kissing the top of his head. “I’m sorry it took us so long, Darky. Those brutes didn’t hurt you, did they?”

“No, I even got a nap out of it,” Dark dismissed, trying to downplay the incident.

“If I’m done,” Google reminded both of them he was still in the room from when Google had brought him through after helping with the cell door because the android wasn’t magical in nature.

“Yes, if you don’t come into work tomorrow, I won’t question it,” Dark told him.

Google didn’t look a gift horse in the mouth and left through a portal that Dark summoned for him. Leaving Wil and Dark alone.

“I should go back there and give them a piece of my mind,” Wilford threatened angrily. “Putting you in that cage. I should have done something more. I had so many plans for tonight.”

“We’ll pick them up tomorrow, Wil. Come to bed, I’m tired.” Dark stroked the side of Wil’s face.

Wilford smiled lovingly, he changed into his own sleepwear and laid next to Dark, watching over him as he slept until Wilford too fell asleep, curled around his love protectively.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And no the museum heist has nothing to do with Mark’s Heist for the Anomaly in A Heist with Markiplier. It realized it might be take that way after I wrote this.


	14. The Most Dangerous Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roman is far from home with a madman chasing him, if he can escape with his life he has survived the most dangerous game.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Sport  
> This story takes place at the same time that Day 16 will take place. So forgive the break in flow tomorrow it was how the prompts and plot bunnies worked out.

Roman raced through the thick, humid forest. He’d been running for a while, trying to hide his trail from the complete psycho chasing . . . hunting after him.

He heard the sound of dogs barking in the distance, loud booming barks that sounded more like they came from beasts of hell than actual dogs.

With a running start, Roman ran up a tree trunk for two steps before he jumped up to grab a tree trunk and start pulling himself up the tree. He climbed up a ways to try and hide. Roman had managed to get towards the edge of the stretch of jungle. Trees were just sparse enough he could see a train station.

His heart seemed to beat quickly in relief if he could find someone else maybe he could get some help!

“Tally-ho!” Wilford called up the tree and blew his hunting horn. Three huge black dogs half the mad man’s size were snarling at the base of the tree. Their eyes black and white foam frothing from their mouths and burning the ground the drool fell onto. They were hellhounds, and they did not give up once they got a scent on a quarry.

Wilford had an old bolt action hunting rifle in his hand. “You really didn’t try too hard, did you?”

“You’re insane,” Roman yelled at him. “Who the hell hunts people?”

“Well maybe if humans weren’t a challenge I’d stop,” Wil scoffed and started to load his rifle again, a huge smile on his face.

Frantic, Roman began searching his pockets for something useful and immediately found a smoke stick in his front pocket.

The creative Side looked at the smoke stick, broke it, and waited until it started billowing large plumes of smoke before dropping it down. The effect was that Wilford and his dogs were surrounded by smoke. Roman scrambled down and ran in the direction of the train, desperate for freedom. He was scrambling over rocks and logs. The smoke clouding the senses of the hounds as Roman himself was coughing for air.

He ran faster than he thought he could run, but he was desperate to get away from the mad hunter and his dogs.

Roman broke through the tree line and to him horror and relief the tree was already starting to move. Relief because it would be a chance to actually escape, and horror because he was still so far away.

A bullet grazed Roman’s cheek, making him scream and stumble a bit, but he recovered and kept running.

“What did you do to my dogs!” Wilford shouted, starting to reload his rifle. “You’re not getting away from me.”

Roman reached out for the train car railing that guarded the back door. He jumped and managed to grab onto it. ‘

His hands grabbed on but one of his feet slipped. Roman’s heart threatened to give out, that he was going to miss the train or get run over.

But before Roman could bash his head on the railing, someone grabbed onto his arm and the back of his shirt to keep him upright and with the train until the creative Side could get his footing.

As Roman was trying to vault himself over the railing Wilford shot at him again, a bullet grazed Roman’s arm. He let out a scream but the train was picking up and left the mad hunter behind.

Looking up Roman saw J.J pulling him to his feet and tugging him into the train car. There Roman could finally catch his breath.

__ _ “You okay?” _ J.J signed.

“Yeah, yeah,” Roman said, sighing along with it. “Any chance that this thing is Wil proof? Do I need a ticket?”

__ _ “I have yours,” _ J.J pulled out an unmarked ticket and passed it to Roman. He looked nervous but started to lead Roman down the train, the high speed vehicle heading to Egoton.


	15. Not Supposed to be a Babysitter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ed just wants some peace and quiet on a stressful day, but Dark brought his gaggle pack of demon spawn in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Drowsy  
> Chapter warning for cannibalism and gore mention because of Bim being hungry.

~::~ Thirteen Years Ago ~::~

To put it simply, and in the most polite terms: Dark’s kids were brats.

Ed didn’t know what he expected from them. He saw Bim for the first time and was suspicious, about a lot of things really. But the more time he spent around that hellian confirmed that he had Wil’s downright insufferable personality, with Dark’s superiority complex.

And Dark’s new adopted wards were developing similar complexes, just at different levels. Most people, for some reason, couldn’t tell the difference. But Ed had no problem. Illinois was a smart ass that Ed had put good money on the fact that the kid would lose his teeth before he hit twenty. Arthur was a sadist and monster that was shaping up to be a murderer. Yan was turning into the spoiled princess Wil claimed she was. Bim was a primadonna . . . that ate people. The first time Ed had seen it he’d walked in on  _ “lunch time” _ and he’d run out after seeing the boy’s chin dripping with blood and gore, and thrown up in a trash can. Ed’s salary was raised considerably to overlook the incident and not mention it to anyone.

Ed had realized that his gut instinct to avoid the kid had been spot on.

So far only Kay and Yancy we’re still normal, but Ed knew that wouldn’t last. The other kids were their own version of psychotic, these two didn’t stand a chance.

It left Ed unsurprised and irritated because these weren’t kids that he could chew the parents out and tell them never to bring their kids back to work. These were  _ Dark’s _ kids. His  _ boss’s _ kids. He couldn’t tell Dark off for raising psychopaths.

No matter how tempted he was because Dark had brought all six of them to the warehouse and kept them in his office while the Manor was  _ “cleansed of parasites” _ .

So far he’d gone a couple hours without seeing them but when Google told Ed to head to his office and to not knock when he walked in he knew his luck had run out.

When Ed started walking down the hall he saw Dark talking with Arthur and  _ “Junior”. _

“I don’t wanna!” Arthur shouted angrily,, Dark had a hold on his upper arm as Arthur tried to twist away.

“Hmmmm!” Bim complained, stomping his feet while he was making little whining noises.

Dark looked at Ed and he actually looked relieved, and Ed knew that he was about to be put on babysitting duty.

__ _ Fuck! _ Ed thought to himself, today was already stressful enough.

“There you are,” Dark said to Ed, part of his aura subconsciously moving to straighten out his suit. “I need you to look after the others, Author doesn’t nap and he woke Bim up. Just go in there, keep quiet and if they wake up I’ll deal with it when I get back.”

“—ad!” Bim complained as he pulled on Dark’s other arm insistently.

“I know,” Dark told Bim and picked him up with his aura before ripping open a portal. “We’re seeing Google first.”

Then Dark tugged Arthur through the portal and everything was blissfully silent. Groaning to himself and regretting helping Dark get more kids, Ed rolled his eyes and contemplated if it was worth it to tell Dark to fuck off. They were  _ his _ kids.

But Ed quietly opened the door and walked in. The lights were mostly turned off and he heard the soft sounds of breath and soft music. The only light came from a glowing yellow  _ “G”. _

Confused, Ed looked at the yellow Google, noticing that he had Yan sleep in his lap. Yancy and Illinois on either side of him. Each of them had a pillow stuffed under their head and a blanket covering them.

Looking around a bit, Ed saw that Kay was sleeping underneath Dark’s desk. He was curled up with a blanket and two stuffed animals.

Eager to keep demon children asleep, Ed quickly signed,  _ “Dark’s looking for you.” _

A screen popped up in front of the yellow Google, the screen turned all the way down.  _ “I am Google Mark 3, Dark is looking for the central Google unit.” _

Ed felt a spike of alarm, one was dicey to work around, but there were  _ three _ of them now? But this Google wasn’t doing anything and the kids were asleep so he just took a seat and waited.

The kids stayed asleep, much to Ed’s relief. He jumped when Dark crept back in through a portal, Bim was sleeping in his arms. The Entity didn’t even talk to Ed or the yellow Google, he looked around the room and checked under his desk.

Once Dark’s check of the room was done, he carefully set Bim with the other kids, in a spot behind the yellow Google that Ed had missed seeing.

Ed wasn’t freed to go, but Dark didn’t say or do anything when the atmosphere got Ed to take a nap as well. He woke up to the sounds of someone talking.

“I’m hungry,” Bim announced, pulling on Dark’s arm. Dark was trying to fish Kay out from underneath his desk who looked a bit disoriented.

“Which one?” Dark asked as Kay clung to the front of Dark’s suit.

“I want waffles,” Bim announced, grabbing onto the right side of Dark’s suit.

“Oooh!” Yan rushed over to Dark, holding onto the other side.

“Alright, fine, but I need to grab Author first,” Dark acquiesced. “Ed, you can go back to whatever you were doing.”

“You,” Dark looked at the yellow Google, checking his clock. “We’ll be back at three, I’ll pick you up.”

“Of course,” the yellow Google responded.

“Why can’t Ollie come with?” Kay asked, his words muffled against Dark’s shirt.

“That’s not his name,” Dark corrected. “The Googles don’t have names.”

“I like the name Oliver,” the yellow Google corrected, having that same unblinking stare that the original Google did.

Dark and Ed just stared at the android with surprise. Bim looked smug, “Told yah his name was Oliver.”

“So it seems,” Dark commented. “Well then,  _ Oliver, _ unless Google has you on a particular task, you can come with us.”

“Google wants to test blood spatter patterns,” Oliver declined.

“Great I’m not getting Author back from that, he adores Google,” Dark rolled his eyes. “I’ll see you there then.”

Dark took his charges through a portal, leaving Ed and Oliver in the office.

Ed rushed to turn on the light, “So they made more ‘a yah.”

“Google seeks to even the odds between us and humanity, he is currently working on a fourth model,” Oliver told him.

“Fun, so Dark rented yah out to be his babysitter?” Ed asked him, following Oliver out of the office.

“My current tasks include tutoring and watching after Dark’s Lost Ones so that Google doesn’t have to,” Oliver answered. “You were called in because Author doesn’t nap and he likes to wake the others.”

Yikes, those kids are doomed, Ed thought but instead said, “Yep, glad that’s not my job. Have fun, buddy.”

Ed walked away, and when he got a nice bonus in his next paycheck it had a memo attached to it, saying: “ _ It’s your job if I say it is.” _

Rolling his eyes, Ed looked at the amount again and decided that for that much, then yeah it was his job.


	16. Runaway Rail Line

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One train. One trio of heroes. One hour before they reach the city.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Train  
> Warning for slight gore, dead bodies, and body horror in this chapter.  
> This story takes place at the same time that Day 14. So forgive the break tomorrow it was how the prompts and plot bunnies worked. This is kinda like a part two of Day 14.  
> Also the big blocks of italicized paragraphs are Abe’s greyscale monologues.

__ _ Trains, steel racing along iron rails. The backbone of the country had been laid on lines like this. _

__ _ I should have known when I boarded the train that this ride was dangerous, but I was without a detective partner since my last’s rather unfortunate demise. Without backup or aid. But I was hunting down a killer, a monster on the loose and I couldn’t just afford to let this opportunity pass me by. It was— _

Abe was suddenly violently shaken from his inner monologue by J.J who looked concerned and relieved to see him. Cautiously, he signed,  _ “Abe?” _

“Jay?” Abe asked before he stood up, “great, I’m in need of some help. So I guess you’re my new partner.”

__ _ “No,” _ J.J told him.

“It’ll be fine,” Abe promised, waved him off, clapping his hand on J.J’s shoulder. “Come on partner.”

__ _ “I’m not your partner,” _ J.J informed, his hands moving quickly in exasperation.  _ “I need to show you something.” _

“Lead the way,” Abe motioned and J.J led him along the length of the train. During their entire trek down the length of the carriages. They didn’t see a single soul. There were overhead luggages, dinner placements in the dining carriage that had various states of consumption. There were even wine glasses left on the tables and the bar counter. Where someone had been there and eaten but no one was there now.

But the passengers and train crew were gone.

Abe looked as worried as J.J. Then with a slow, soft lurch the behemoth of metal let out its horn and began moving.

“Shit!” Abe said, turning towards the front of the car, “that means there has to be a driver.”

Some invisible force rolled over both him and J.J made an abrupt heel turn and raced for the back of the train at full speed as Abe ran for the front.

__ _ Little did I know the horrors that awaited us. The unfathomable, unspeakable horrors of death that awaited to swallow us whole. And the fate that J.J had saved us from. _

The Detective raced through train after train empty, without a soul or ticket taker in sight. But despite his hopes, the front car was empty. Instead of trying to turn the train off and make it worse, Abe headed back down the train to find J.J.

Abe walked out of the conductor’s car to see J.J walking in from the opposite door with Roman.

“How long have you been here?” Abe asked Roman.

“Just got here,” Roman told him, looking around. “J.J helped me get on, Wil’s been chasing me all day.”

“Is he on the train?” Abe demanded.

“No,” Roman reached up to touch the side of his face, the one with a slightly burnt scratch on it. He hissed in pain a bit. “No, I think we lost him.”

He looked at the empty seats, “Hey, I’m going to get some rest.”

“I’ll comb the train for clues,” Abe told them, turning to J.J, “partner you’re with me.”

J.J rolled his eyes, but as Roman laid down on a group of seats, the mute hero looked around the room, but walked out with Abe, watching Roman as he walked out.

__ _ tkk tkk tkk tkk _

Went a noise somewhere along the ceiling of Roman’s train car.

__ _ Evil lives not just in the heart of humanity, but in the world around it. I’ve seen a madman kill and maim, a demon corrupt towns from the inside out. And a herd of maniacs in horse masks stampeding through a cornfield. _

__ _ But I shouldn’t bore you with the details. _

__ _ Evil lives, it breathes, it sinks its claws into its unwilling victims. Today it had burrowed and crawled its retched way into a train. _

Roman was peacefully napping on the chairs as the train roof seemed to bulge out right above Roman. A low pitched, almost infrasound hiss let out as the camouflage began to drop and what looked like a huge insect that resembled a spider but had too many legs and body segments to be a spider. The face looked like a melted, bloated, pale doll’s face. A liquid dripping from its face and when it contacted the cotton seats it hissed and burned holes into the fabric.

That was that sound that woke Roman up, he blinked awake and when he saw the monster in front of him, Roman let out a scream and summoned his sword as the creature lunged at him, jaws splitting open like a snake.

J.J seemingly came out of nowhere and hit the creature with a crowbar, the two weapons able to knock the creature fell against the floor as Abe burst in with his gun in hand.

“What’s going on in here?” Abe demanded before he looked at the monster. “Sweet fuck what is that?”

It hissed at them,  _ “Feed!” _

“Sweet severed heads of the hydra!” Roman exclaimed. “How long has this monster been here?”

The beast turned its head and charged for the door, it was faster than expected but not faster enough that Abe couldn’t easily dodge out of the way.

The chitterious creature surged through the door and towards the end of train.

“What is that thing?” Roman demanded.

J.J pulled out some of his premise cards, the first one read:  _ “Train heading towards Egoton. Have to stop it beforehand.” _

He passed the cards to Roman and they quickly lined out some information. But the warning on one of the cards came a bit late when the three of them ran into the dining cart and found  _ some _ of the missing passengers. They were stuck to the walls and the ceiling and there seemed to be some pulsing egg sack stuck to the corner.

All the passengers were dead, their faces not melted or warped but completely missing. Roman immediately got sick to his stomach. Their skin a chalky pale.

The creature turned back to hiss at them, sharp fangs bared at them.

Roman was readying his sword. “You fiend!”

Abe readied his gun, “Please tell me it dies.”

J.J signaled yes.

Roman jumped at the beast, easily rolling out of the way when the creature tried to snap at him. Abe took aim at the monster from a distance as Roman kept slashing at it until it fell over and was just a twitching mass.

J.J took care of the egg sack.

The creative Side stepped away from the beast, burnt and hole patches on his clothing and other parts splashed with a viscous slime. “Ugh,” Roman complained. “My fabulous uniform.”

“We need to stop this train before it crashes into something,” Abe reminded. “Then we can worry about everything else.”

“There is no need for the heroes to worry,” the Host announced himself. “The Host has already ensured that the train will stop safely.”

“Did you have anything to do with this?” Abe holstered his gun and stomped over to the Host, Roman rushing to get out of the car with the bodies. The other three followed him.

“No,” the Host said. “The events here are the product of a new direction. A changing of hands, of sorts. The Host didn’t know the extent of the action until he realized that the Detective, Creativity, and J.J were in danger.”

“So it was you,” Abe accused.

The Host smiled at them, “No, the Host would never do something off-page that no one could witness in the hopes that a third party wouldn’t realize they were being deceived.”

“Can you stop speaking in riddles,” Abe demanded.

The Host looked down the corridor, “Well whatever happened, that the Host was  _ certainly _ not present for, it shuffled both the League and the Coalition around.”

“Well what  _ were _ you doing then?” Roman demanded.

With a smile, the Host pulled out a headset with a small microphone attached to it from his coat. “The Host was merely getting this microphone. It is quite convenient.”

“Well I hope it was worth it,” Abe told him. “You frustrating maniac.”

“It was, things should return to normal now that  _ nothing _ was happened,” the Host promised

“Right,” Abe grumbled in frustration. “As long as I don’t fight another face monster.”

“That is not in the plans for the Detective, but the Host does have something to tell him,” the Host leaned in close to Abe and whispered, “The Host does not like to be interrupted.”

“I didn’t interrupt you,” Abe responded.

“The Detective interrupted the Host three times,” the Host corrected. “Do not do so again.”

Rolling his eyes, Abe told him, “Taking a nap, have fun being cryptic.”

In a half-hour’s time, the train would pull into the closest Egoton train station. Police and other heroes flooding the area as the train was searched and investigated.


	17. Pin the Flag on the Eldritch Demon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s like pin the tail on the donkey. Except the pin is a flag, and the donkey is a bad-tempered demon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: flag

Anti was using his aura to throw rocks at the alley wall. “I’m so fookin’ bored.”

“Then why don’t you kill someone?” Remus was physically sitting on a dumpster, looking down at him. “That’s what you usually do.”

__ _ “Pbbbbttttt,” _ Anti answered, sticking his tongue out. “Already fookin’ did that, bored.”

“Hmmmm,” Remus tapped his chin, then he gasped and leaned forward. “Ooh! Ooh! What about Willy? He’s fun, maybe we could commit some good old arson?”

“He’s with Dark, he’s been up his ass all week since that fookin’ museum lift happened,” Anti complained.

“Kinky,” Remus smiled, waggling his eyebrows.

Anti smiled and chucked a small rock at Remus’s head, the pebble bouncing off him harmlessly. “Wil just got clingy, which means Wil’s about as much fun as a hernia.”

“What if we just pissed Dark off?” Remus proposed.

“If you’ve got any ideas, I’m all ears,” Anti smiled. “He barely gets huffy anymore when I try to piss him off.”

“You just lack imagination,” Remus shimmied his shoulders and jumped down from the dumpster. “What gets him really fired up?”

“Fook if I know anymore,” Anti grumbled. “Back in the day I used ta be able ta just smile at Wil an’ he’d lose his fookin’ mind. It was amazin’ and he’d even get so angry he’d kill other people it was great. An’ then he just stopped being so pissed. Now he doesn’t even get pissed when I take Bim out on the town.”

“What if we hit him or piss in his coffee?” Remus asked, saying the first things that came into his mind.

“Normally that’d be a great idea, but Wil’s laser focused,” Anti warned.

“On Dark’s ass?” Remus asked to clarify.

“Sure,” Anti grumbled. “But with how Wil’s been acting, if we stab Dark and Will is still in his mood then we’ve got a problem because I don’t fookin’ mess with him when he’s sane.”

“Is he fun?” Remus smiled.

“No,” Anti told him. “Not fun. Whatever we do, we can’t piss him off.”

“Okay,” Remus hummed, and summoned something that was a black headband with bright pride flags fused to either side of it and in bright blue and red letting it read:  _ “I’M A MORONSEXUAL” _ .

“Nice,” Anti agreed. “Let’s do this. I’ll distract ‘em, yeh place it.”

“Yes!” Remus cheered, throwing his hands up in the air, like an overexcited child.

It took Anti and Remus a bit to find Dark. Wilford and Dark were on a bit of a stroll. Wilford was concentrating a bit too much on the things around him.

Anti liked to rag on Dark a lot for stuff, but he had to admit that Dark was one of the only people who had the balls to hang out around Wilford whether he was in a manic episode, a sane episode, or was his normal bubbly self.

“Hey lovebirds,” Anti greeted.

Dark frowned, just glaring at Anti as he held onto Wil’s upper arm.

“Anti,” Wilford smiled, as cheery as ever. “Nice to see you out on the town again.”

“Yeah, just came in ta see if yeh were doin’ anythi’ fun,” Anti smiled, and Dark’s glare became more suspicious.

“Well it’s always nice to see you,” Wil smiled, looking over at Dark, “isn’t it, Darky?”

“Yes,” Dark’s tone sounded like he’d swallowed turpentine. “It—”

That’s when Remus struck, a tentacle sneaking in to quickly place the headband on Dark’s head. Dark’s aura was just as fast, pushing Remus away. But the band landed slanted on Dark’s head.

Wilford was a half-second slower but he pulled out his prized revolver and pointed it point blank at Remus’s face. The intrusive Side froze as Wilford stared at him.

“Oh, Remus,” Wilford smiled, suddenly all smiles and pulled his gun back. “For a second there I thought you were someone else.”

Remus, to his credit, just smiled at Wil, “Who?”

“Oh one of those brutes in the colored outfits,” Wilford dismissed. “That fiend got a bit rough with Darky and I couldn’t left such brutality slide.”

“I was fine, he barely laid a finger on me,” Dark took the band off and glared at it. “What is this?”

“Yah like it, Dark?” Anti grinned. “It suits yah.”

“I love those colors,” Wil smiled.

“Good,” Dark’s aura raked over the words printed on it, blank paint covering the words. He placed it on Wil’s head. “Enjoy.”

Wil made an excited noise, “Oooh, you’re the best Darky. I should go show the kids. You going to be alright by yourself?”

“Of course,” Dark told him. “If it makes you feel better, I plan on working from my home office today.”

Wil’s smile got warmer, “Call for me if you need me, my dearest.”

Dark kept his smile until Wil left through a portal, then it dropped. “Ughhh! Thank you! He’s been on me all week.”

“Kinky,” Remus wriggled his eyebrow.

“Shut it, before I change my mind,” Dark told Remus.

“How’s Bubbles?” Anti asked.

Rolling his eyes, Dark straightened out his suit, “Nothing I can’t handle. What were you two doing? I’m willing to bet you were aiming to upset me again.”

“Fookin’ with yeh,” Anti told him proudly. “Couldn’t do much cause Bubbles would’a gotten pissed.”

“And?” Dark asked.

“I don’t like him when he’s sane,” Anti told Dark.

“I think he’s fun,” Remus smiled.

“Course yah do, yeh’ve never had ta deal with him like that,” Anti reminded sharply.

Dark scoffed, opening up a void portal, “Well if you two are done, I have work to do.”

“Ehh, fook off an’ jump in a ditch, old man,” Anti smiled, “if Wil’s back ta normal, I’ll find him. Come, Remus.”

Dark left, allowing Remus and Anti to find Wilford and cause some good old fashioned chaos.


	18. What’s There to Talk About?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Visitation day. Yancy is watching a storm coming down from the base’s garage, taking in the smell. Host joins him and the two reconnect a bit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: weather

Yancy was sitting in the little smoking nook just outside the garage. It was the spot where if a hero needed a smoke, like him, Abe, or Chase, they could take it.

He was technically still in the base since the barrier safely extended over this portion of it, and it also had a little roof for when it rain.

And today it was just coming down in sheets, it was very soothing to watch and listen to. To feel the chill late autumn breeze, the shelter got most of the rain but some of the spray still blew towards him.

It was very relaxing.

The front door opened and Yancy saw the Host rush over to him. Yancy eyed him warily.

The Host stared in Yancy’s direction. “Does Yancy mind if the Host joins him?”

“Sure, why’s not?” Yancy shrugged, gesturing to the rest of the bench, scooting over. “Youse smoke?”

“No,” Host didn’t move to sit down, he was fidgeting with his sleeves a little bit. “No, the Host merely . . .”

The seer seemed uneasy, “The Host wanted to talk with Yancy, but now that he’s here, he doesn’t know what to say.”

“Well, whatever youse gotta talk ‘bout, I’s can listen,” Yancy offered.

The Host buried his hands in his pockets, “Maybe the Host doesn’t deserve to be listened to. He knows that Yancy sees the Author in the Host.”

Yancy felt guilty, knowing that the Host was right, there’d be times when the Host would say something, or bite his lip in concentration when he was working on something, or he’d laugh. Host and Author had the same throaty chuckle that tended to make the hairs on Yancy’s neck stand on end.

“That’s my problem, Host,” Yancy told. “I’s just need ta get over my bullshit.”

The Host looked away, pulling his coat higher around his neck.

“Come on, bro, take youself a seat,” Yancy patted the bench. “So long as youse don’t mind the smoke.”

Slowly the Host moved over to sit next to Yancy but didn’t move closer, just sitting close to the edge, hands in his lap.

“Is Artie still in there?” Yancy asked, taking another long puff of his cigarette.

“No, the Author is dead,” the Host answered, not even looking towards Yancy. “Occasionally the Host will have thoughts reminiscent of the Author’s thoughts. He has threatened violence upon others, but the Host does not seek out victims like the Author did.”

“Okay, so if youse is different then that’s it,” Yancy told him. “I’s just gotta get over myself is all.”

“Yancy’s hesitancy is warranted,” the Host corrected. “The Author was not nice to Yancy.”

“Yeah? Well, Artie wasn’t nice ta anyone,” the Yancy reminded. “Sides, Kay got the worst ‘a it. Youse got his memories?”

“Yes, the Host has all of the Author’s memories,” the Host nodded.

“An’ Kay spends time wit’ youse so there,” Yancy shrugged, bringing the cigarette back to his lips. “Youse even got somethin’ Artie could nevers get. Youse know what that is?”

The Host paused to think for a second, “The Host has the respect of his peers and those around him?”

Yancy just stared at him, clearly not expecting that answer, “Well, yes, but the answer I’s was goin’ fer was a boyfriend. Youse got a boyfriend.”

“Oh,” the Host, with his immense vocabulary and eloquence, fumbled to say. “Yes, the Host does have one of those.”

“So, don’t be so hard on youself,” Yancy smiled. “Come on, how’s can I’s help youse feel better?”

The Host hunched his shoulders a little, not sure of the answer himself.

Yancy hummed a bit as he blew out a bit of smoke. Then, almost like a lightbulb went off in his head, “ _ Oohh! _ Youse remember when Kay first started tryin’ ta talk ta the animals in the park? Before he actually could?”

“Vaguely,” the Host answered, but the shadow of a smile began to creep up on his face.

“It was back when me an’ him were eight, or was it nine?” Yancy thought out loud. “But he’s thought that animals really liked him back then so Illinois and Artie dared him to prove it.”

“Insects were hard for the King of the Squirrels to master,” the Host agreed, his mood improved marginally.

“ _ Ooh, _ I’s bet, remember how he went:  _ ‘animals love me, see?’ _ and then he stuck his hand inta a bush?” Yancy laughed. “An’ Dark thought we’d done somethin’ ta him because ‘a how loud he was screamin’ an’ all.”

“The Host remembers that the Author’s laughter didn’t help their case,” the Host agreed.

“Hey if Kay wants ta be an idiot an’ stick his hand in a bee bush, not my fault,” Yancy chuckled. “Jokes on us ‘cause he’s right now.”

There was a small smile on Host’s face.

Yancy just kept telling stories as the rain just beat down on the shelter roof. Some stories from their days living in the Manor, others from his prison days. Host didn’t let out the full chuckle that Yancy wanted, but he let Yancy sit closer to him.

He smiled.

Yancy called that a victory, and it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Story told at the end is courtesy of one of Mark’s childhood stories he told in his Firewatch playthrough, the one about the bee bush.


	19. Found and Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s cleaning day in the base’s storage room, some things are found within the many boxes, others are lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: cap hat  
> While I was planning out Egotober 2020, Seán found his old hat, so I had to capitalize on the day where the plot was “cap hat”. In equally important news it’s the anniversary to the first Sanders’s Side episode. So enjoy.

It was a rare day in the heroes’ base. It was storage cleaning day. Or it was more accurate to say that Henrik got upset at the state the storage room was always in and pitched enough of a fit that Seán muttered a _“Fine!”_ and organized a group to go clean it.

The storage room was also known as the _“garbage room”_ by several heroes. Since everything that couldn’t go in the normal rooms went in the storage room. The problem was that seasonal decorations also went in the storage room. And so did all the heroes’ medical and personal records.

So occasionally stuff was just left to pile up and build for years and years. Some boxes, i.e. anything that Henrik or Logan had to touch was clean and organized. Everyone else’s belongings were in a sliding scale of neat and tidy, or haphazardly thrown into a box.

Mark was ordered to move all the decorations and stuff that would wind up going back into the storage room. Iplier kept all the records in his room, but it resulted in a row of boxes going down the hallway and Henrik looking like he was going to have an aneurysm. He was only coaxed into calming down with the promise that I’d be gone by the end of the week. Everyone would come in and organize their stuff, and the storage boxes would go back in.

Nate, Logan, and Henrik had already done their boxes earlier that morning. Now Seán and Amy were in the storage room.

“That’s the last of it,” Mark walked in, dusting off his hands as he started walking off. “I’m gonna get myself something to drink, cause I don’t keep stuff.”

“Can you get me something?” Amy looked up at him.

Mark stopped and leaned back into the room, “Iced coffee?”

“Thanks,” she smiled back, Mark smiled at her before leaving.

Seán was mostly digging through boxes, sorting through boxes almost meticulously, trash going into a bag, papers going into files, and other stuff going into boxes.

Then he let out an audible gasp, “ _Ooh! Oooohhhh!_ I knew it was in here!”

“What? What is it?” Amy asked in interest.

He stuck his hand all the way to the bottom and pulled out a grey flat cap hat. A huge smile on his face and he slid it on his head. “ _Ahh,_ nice. I _knew_ it had ta be in here.”

“Did you find it?” Amy smiled. “I thought you lost that thing out in town?”

“Nah, I put it in some box an’ then the box got moved out here,” Seán smiled, taking out his phone and looking at himself with the camera. “ _Ahh,_ I look like such a little kid.”

“Did someone find embarrassing pictures?” Mark smiled as he flew back in, an energy drink in one hand and a bottle of iced coffee in the other.

“Didn’t you lose that one when Anti tried to electrocute you?” Mark grinned as he handed Amy her coffee.

“My lucky hat can survive the frigid vacuum ‘a Dark’s soul,” Seán boasted. “I knew if I actually cleaned stuff out I’d find it. It was either here or in my garage.”

“You gonna wear it with your costume again?” Amy asked.

“I dunno, been a couple years,” Seán shrugged, taking the hat off and looking at it fondly. “Don’t worry, won’t lose yah this time.”

At that moment, arguing started to come down from the hallway. It was a couple seconds later that the Sides walked in. Logan with some folded boxes, duct tape, and several trash bags.

Virgil was right behind him with Roman. _“Ughh,”_ the anxious Side began to complain. “We’ll be here all day.”

Patton had a huge smile on his face as he walked in with an old WWI-era camera. “We should be done soon.”

Logan had insisted on bringing the camera with them after Janus had threatened to break it several times. He didn’t like the camera, complaining about the humming being insufferable. A sound none of the other Sides could actually hear themselves.

“Most of this stuff is yours, Patt,” Virgil reminded. “I haven’t been here long enough to make a mess.”

Patton set down the camera, “And it’s all important memories, so it won’t take long for us to be done.”

Mark and Jack looked at the camera, something about it just not sitting right, like it was a black hole of attention, demanding that someone look at it, pay attention to it . . . pick it up . . .

“Falsehood,” Logan corrected firmly. “You hoard garbage of sentimental value, you need to let them go.”

“But— I—” Patton fumbled.

“Garbage?” Roman dug through one of the Sides’ many, _many_ boxes to tug out some plastic flowers. “They’re not garbage.”

“Do not enable him,” Logan warned angrily. “This has been going on for too long.”

The camera just sat in the middle of the Sides, making the other three people in the room a bit uncomfortable. Before Mark could speak up, all their communicators were off. Some big catastrophe was going on in downtown Brighton. It was Wilford in one of his manic episodes.

“Oh look at that,” Patton said, “we have to go save the day.”

“When we all get back we are finishing what we started,” Logan told him as his suit began to snap around him and his visor came down. “Head out, I’ll take the communication chair.”

All four of the Sides raced out and the instant they were out of the room, the camera had less of a malignant buzz to it. It was almost like it was just a normal camera, but there was something wrong about it.

Jack, Mark, and Amy chose to leave the suit up. Figuring that it could be dealt with when they all got back. The base was safe, no one would steal stuff from the storage room.

Nate missed the summons, he was set to go on tour and was already late. But while he’d been cleaning out his stuff, he’d forgotten a little book of phone numbers he wanted to get from his stuff. They were all old numbers he’d been meaning to get around to being in contact with, but dreading doing so all the same.

But he needed to do it now, or they’d track him down. They’d find out about Mare, and Nate didn’t want to admit that he’d gotten attached to the demon. That they had a fragile partnership.

Those thoughts went out of his head when he walked into the room and he felt like something had hit him in the face. His ears popped with the pressure in the room and reaching up to check on his nose, he noticed that when he pulled his hand away there was blood on his fingers.

“ _Arrghhhh,_ what the hell,” Nate grumbled, his ears ringing.

_Hmmmmm . . ._

Nate looked around the room, trying to see if something had snuck into the base. He saw an old camera just sitting there in the middle of the Sides’ mess of stuff. He didn’t feel like something was staring at him, but he did feel like something was in the room with him, sleeping but it could wake at any moment.

The humming was almost sing-song-esq in quality. Like a song Nate had heard but couldn’t place it right now.

He saw that camera and his blood chilled, he could _feel_ what it was, what it had been used to do. And he lunged for it, high stepping over things, snatching it off the table and racing to his box to dig through it until he found the old spiral bound pocket notebook, and raced out of the room and out of the base as if someone had lit him on fire. The camera in his hands as he got into his car and raced for the tour meetup spot to properly figure out where this thing had been.

He had to get this thing out of the base, he’ll if he could get this thing out of the city that would be enough.

Logan would walk back into the storage room later that night, crisis over and his heart plummeted when he saw the camera gone. He felt like something had been ripped away from him. Checking the camera he watched Nate walk in, get a bloody nose, and then run off with the camera in a clear panic.

Trying to call Nate resulted in only reaching his voicemail, but Logan tried not to panic, leaving him a message to call them about the box he’s taken.

The next day, Logan woke up to a message on his phone that read: _“It’s cursed, keeping it in containment. We’ll talk when I get back.”_

Logan frowned, worried and remorseful, but he had to trust Nate would not do anything drastic, that it was safe with Nate. He texted back and asked for Nate to keep the object intactic, and the singer promised he would.

With that, Logan regrettably admitted to himself that there was nothing he could do, and get his phone aside to get an early start to his day.


	20. Exercise in Denial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Janus meets with an old friend turned enemy.

Janus was walking around the old subway tunnels outside Egoton. Virgil and Janus had rescued Logan from Bim and Dark’s clutches once, and while Janus figured he’d never go back, here he was again.

He wasn’t here to mess around with Dark, no the Entity had vacated the area after Logan’s escape, obviously fearful that his cannibalistic hellspawn would get his feeding ground found out by the police.

Dark was right though, Abe and the police had searched through as much of the old tunnels as they could but any proof of Bim’s feeding habits or victims was gone and destroyed.

Today Janus was following a magical trail, one he’d been avoiding out of anger. But deep in the tunnels he found something that looked like someone had set up a residence in the cursed shadow of Dark’s old base.

“Orange,” Janus called, looking at the orange and white tea lights that lit up the little den. It was sparsed out with belongs that made the cold cave livable.

The Side in question poked his head out from behind a bean bag chair. He glared and rolled his eyes at Janus as he got up. “What’s wrong  _ Deceit _ ? We not using first names anymore?”

“I came to check up on you,” Janus managed to say through clenched teeth.

“Always with the lies, Dee,” Orange scoffed and walked over to a little desk and sat on it. “Why are you  _ really _ here?”

“I don’t like not knowing what you’re doing,” Janus admitted. “Especially after your altercation with Logan.”

Orange kicked his feet up. “I seem to be the only one actually taking him seriously, you and Remus can’t get enough of him, and just look at what he did to Virgil.”

“Oh yes, because Virgil is doing so much worse without the stress of working with Dark,” Janus reminded him with a deadpan tone.

“You don’t trust Patton,” Orange responded.

“But I do trust Logan, as cold and calculating as he can be sometimes,” Janus corrected. “So long as Logan isn’t silenced, Patton and Roman listen to him.”

“That’s the problem,” Orange debated. “Logan is too smart and too determined not to get what he wants and you should be thanking me for trying to silence him.”

“Never,” Janus hissed.

“Well then you should keep Logan away from me, Dee,” Orange threatened. “Or else I might do something drastic again.”

“It might help if I knew what you were planning,” Janus asked, not so subtly. “I could make sure that Logan stays out of your business.”

Orange just laughed, “Fuck off, Dee. Just run off to Remus and go fuck yourself. As far as you need to know, I’ll be in here, just minding my own business.”

Janus glared at him, crossing his arms in front of himself as his serpentine eye narrowed into a slit. He was letting out a low hiss.

When Orange could control himself enough to stop laughing he leaned in, “You, the League, and the Light Sides can just go and rot for all I care. You want to know what I’ve found out about myself with all this free time I finally have? I found out I don’t need to eat or sleep, or drink anything. I can if I want to, but I don’t need to. And isn’t that interesting? I bet you knew all along didn’t you? That’s why you never liked that camera, right?”

“It’s gone now,” Deceit admitted through clenched teeth, avoiding the barrage of questions wholesale.

“You don’t sound too happy about that,” Orange grinned. “Well if your investigation is done, you can go, tell everyone I’m minding my own business.”

Deceit glared at him but he did leave. He left Orange, and his lies, to the Side’s own devices. Deceit had other things to do with his time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> . . . and they all lied happily never after.


	21. I Always Feel like Somebody’s Watching Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Green takes an opportunity to strike against Oliver.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Portal

Green was searching the streets again, this time for Oliver. Without Google, Oliver was a complete shut in. He stayed in the base unless Bing dragged him out. But it wasn’t enough for Green that he sometimes came out, Oliver was with Bing. And Green couldn’t stand it.

It was even worse because Oliver was obviously having fun . . . with Bing.

But Google had ordered him not to fixate on that.

Green had gotten a little fed up and caved to ask a favor of Dark. Not hard since Green had made every effort to be on his best behavior, but he was given something that had limited uses for Dark’s void portals. Dark could refuse him entry but he could use them like Dark’s children could.

Green used it the next time Oliver went out of the safety of the base. He disobeyed Google’s direct orders to let him know when he could recapture Oliver. To Green, Oliver could continue being with the humans. It was Bing that Green wanted.

The two of them went back to Bing’s favorite skate park. Oliver was sitting on a bench when Green struck. He used one of portal uses to get behind Oliver, the more docile android jumped when he heard the tearing of a portal opening up.

“Hey, Ollie,” Green smiled, his tone dripping with malice. “Having fun?”

“Green!” Oliver yelled and Bing turned to look at them. “Uhh, Green, what do you—”

The more malicious android struck, punching Oliver and knocking him off the bench.

“Green, stop!” Bing called out.

“I’ve been waiting to tear you apart!” Green lunged at Oliver. When Bing was close enough, Green used one of his portals to send Bing to the other side of the city.

“What’d you do to him?” Oliver demanded, getting up.

“Oh you know how Bing gets, he likes to help,” Green smiled, a couple laser points dropping out of his frame. “So I sent him to the other side of town.”

Oliver at first felt relief, that Bim was safe, then Green began trying to shoot him with lasers and the yellow android’s own nanites raced to absorb them an keep them away from the other people at the park.

“By the time Bing gets back, all you’re going to be is a pile of scrap, not even fit to make a toaster,” Green threatened, trying to send his lasers through a port to get behind Bing but the Void devoured the energy instead.

Then a half-empty can of soda sailed at Green, hitting the android in the back. The android turned, eyes and logo a vibrant green as he glared at the young man holding his skateboard in the air. “Get away from him.”

“Insect,” Green snarled, taking a step forward. “How dare you!”

The young man raised his board but that’s when Green sank into a portal that spit him out into Dark’s office, the result was that Dark’s office door was lit on fire with a laser.

“If you’re quite done,” Dark snapped angrily at him. “Look at what you did to my door.”

“I was in the middle of something,” Green shouted angrily at Dark.

“Attacking a romantic rival for existing, I can understand, but using my portals to attack humans without cause brings me problems, so,” Dark summoned a portal dump Green into Google’s workshop where the blue-themed android was angrily waiting for him, “I can’t allow that.”

Back in the skate park everyone just stood in shock at the sudden disappearance, the young man that had come to Oliver’s aid slowly approached him. “Hey, buddy, are you okay?”

“Why did you help me?” Oliver asked.

“Dude, there was a killer robot attacking you,” he answered, “I thought we were done for back there.”

“But I could have defended myself,” Oliver reminded him. “I am also a killer robot.”

“And I’m the King of France,” he shrugged, “there’s nothing killer about you. You hang out around Bing and people watch. I’ve got more chance of dying from tripping over my own shoelaces than getting killed by you.”

Oliver wasn’t quite sure how he felt about that. But the closest emotion was . . . happy. “Thank you, I guess.”

The young man smiled, “You might have been made to be a killer robot, but you don’t have to be one.”

The docile android felt a need to correct him, that Google had made Oliver so he had a place to dump his unwanted emotions. But that point was moot, and when Bing came in in fifteen minutes later and looked relieved to see that apart from some laser scorch damage, everything seemed fine.

Oliver had even made some new friends.


	22. Abort! Abort!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s been a hot minute since Anti properly terrified the Septic’s good doctor. A routine practice that doesn’t go as Anti planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Creep(y)  
> Warnings for minor gore and blood. No one dies in the scene but the gore is there all the same.

Anti slipped through the electrical wires of the Egoton Central hospital, shorting out circuits and crashing computers as he went. The backup generators kicked in pretty quickly and he miraculously didn’t hit any of life-saving machines, but eventually he was at his target, hiding in the walls of an autopsy room in the hospital.

Henrik was there and people were coming in and out. The case was incredibly mysterious and the police wanted it investigated. A man had dropped dead in the streets, no magic involved. Henrik didn’t usually do autopsies, but a more experienced doctor was needed. So Henrik was meticulously working through the body, taking notes. He was certain it was some advanced poison and samples had already been taken up to the lab but Henrik wanted to be sure that there wasn’t some other cause of death.

He was so concentrated on the corpse that he didn’t notice the light flickering or the light, almost silent chuckle.

If he had, Henrik’s reaction would have been unfortunately different.

The table shook and suddenly the body exploded, spraying the German doctor in gore and offal, and Anti smiling with his chin resting on the palms of his hands and his elbows on what remained of the man’s rib cage.

“Hey Doctor-stein,” Anti grinned.

Henrik looked at Anti and instead of fear, all Henrik felt was anger, boiling anger, “Anti, vat are you doing‽ How dare you‽ I am vorking!”

Anti leaned away, not expecting anger from someone he usually had no problem scaring. Henrik was there, screaming and threatening him, covered in gore and . . . was that a chuck of the dead guy’s lower intestine under Henrik’s chin.

A lump formed in Anti’s throat, right above the slash on his throat. The glitch demon was spacing out as Henrik was yelling at him. He reached up to brush the piece of intestine off Henrik’s chin and Henrik was so fearlessly angry that he slapped Anti’s hand away.

There was a weird roiling feeling somewhere in Anti’s body, and so feeling uncomfortable and weird that the rest of him couldn’t take it, he hissed and growled at Henrik, his aura glitching the room around them.

That finally shook Henrik out of his anger and he turned tail and ran, leaving Anti alone in the room.

Anti left before any security or heroes could show up. He felt bad, but not like he did after pulling himself out of a discoporation or like after eating some cursed candy he and Wil had found left in void. This was, almost like he was . . . no!

He was a demon, Anti never felt guilty. Certainly not for a _human_.

But he did want to get Henrik yelling at him again, and if he could be covered in blood while he did so, Anti would certainly _not_ complain.

While he was planning on how to get Henrik that angry again, an unfortunate realization crossed the glitch demon’s mind. That he’d never felt like this towards the other Septics, he couldn’t even recall having this much of attention being devoured by a singular being.

Anti didn’t know if he liked it, he just knew that he wanted to make Henrik really angry at him again.

He needed help. He needed someone who had a shit ton of experience getting someone angry, but having them not be mad at them afterwards.

So Anti went to find Wil. Fortunately Wilford was with Dark. Dark was sitting back watching Wil shoot and stab people. Wil seemed to be having fun. Anti was watching nearby, taking notes on what Wil was doing, how he was saying things. Dark wasn’t pissed off yet but you never knew with Egoton’s premier lovebirds. Anti was definitely not using those fuck-awful pickup lines. Just thinking about them made him want to vomit.

While he was looking down, scratching out something on his notepad, he heard Dark’s ringing get closer. “What are you doing?”

“Fook off yah sack ‘a shite,” Anti spat at him, feeling defensive and suddenly territorial over anything involving Henrik.

Dark was able to glance at the notebook, he saw that it was just endless notes Wilford. What he was doing and what he was saying.

His always constant urge to discoporate Anti reared its angry head again. He was livid! This was _his_ date with Wil, _his_ time with him. Anti could wait his turn, he got him most of the day!

But Wil smiled at Anti, leaning over his shoulder, “What’cha got there?”

Anti shielded his notebook but Wil suddenly appeared on the other side, tilting it down and had this huge shit-eating grin. “Well my friend, if you wanted advice, you just should have asked.”

The glitch demon hissed at him, before Wilford laughed and Anti gave him a slight smile. It was impossible for Anti to stay mad at Wil.

Dark stared at the two of them, misunderstanding the reason Anti was actually there, and quietly ported himself away.

At that moment, Anti looked over at Dark, about to ask him a question, “What Dark, what do—”

But the portal was already closing, Dark’s aura lingering faintly before it was gone.

Anti glared at him, “Well fook yah too.”

Wilford, not noticing that his boyfriend had left, crushed Anti to his side in a half-hug. “Come on, we’re going to woo that boyfriend of yours.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Anti snapped reflexively.

“Not with that attitude,” Wilford promised, a huge smile on his face as he pulled Anti into a different portal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a plan for Anti to think “Oh no! He’s hot!” but it didn’t pan out.


	23. Odd Connections

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Google’s tracking down some names, snipped strings that still lead back to old names, and it leads him to one Dr. Edward Iplier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Strings

The city was to put it nicely: an absolute mess. And not just with the supervillains and their plots of the week, or Dark’s mafia style iron grip of corruption that just seeped into every strata of life in the city.

The hardest impacted were health and social sectors. If they existed pre-1965 then you had a better chance of successfully summoning your deceased, ghostly ancestors to try and ask for the information and then attempt to get that submitted, rather than physically find it.

That alone made Dr. Iplier’s job hell sometimes.

Iplier walked into the break room for a bit and saw Henrik who had his messenger bag on him.

“Long night?” Henrik asked, already changing out of his scrubs.

“Yeah,” Iplier groaned. “You heading out?”

“Ja, but I vill not be able to sleep until I see how the o’zers did today,” Henrik sighed.

Henrik then left and Iplier grabbed another coffee and headed back to his office. He had paperwork to do and it was going to be a long night.

When the doctor stepped into his office everything looked normal. There was no cause for alarm.

“Hello Doctor  _ Iplier, _ ” a flat but malicious tone greeted the doctor from somewhere behind him.

Iplier felt his blood chill and turned to see Google looking at him, and then closed his office door.

“Might we have a little chat, Doctor?” Google let out a little crooked smile that hit the wrong part of the uncanny valley for Iplier’s brain.

“If this is about one of my patients, I’m not able to talk about them,” Iplier bravely proclaimed, his hand going for his watch but something under him shot out and grabbed his watch arm, pulling him down to the ground so that he couldn’t call for help. It was the grey liquid that was made up of Google’s nanites.

“I have no interest in the meat sacks you keep alive, I am interested in you,” Google announced, the smile still on his face. “I should have been looking into you much sooner.”

Iplier began looking around for some kind of weapon, his chances of defending himself against Google wasn’t very good on his own, but he’d be damned if he didn’t at least try. Unfortunately the closest object was his rolling chair.

When he tried to reach for it, he was tugged closer to Google.

“Try not to struggle, it will only hurt more,” Google warned him, grabbing Iplier’s other arm so he couldn’t move.

“Let go of me,” Iplier tried to wrench himself free but this only got him pinned to the ground.

“You humans make things so difficult, I am stronger than you, smarter than you,” Google snarled.

“And yet Google seems to not be smart enough to remember not to touch things he should not.”

Iplier felt all the fear and tension melt out of his body when he recognized the Host’s voice. He would recognize that voice anywhere.

“Host,” Iplier called out and Google turned his head, the rest of his body still facing Iplier.

“I am questioning him,” Google reported as if he was acting perfectly normal.

“The Host thought he was clear to Google, that his doctor was not a target,” the Host reminded.

“He is not physically injured,” Google reminded.

With a few careful words a metal bat appeared in his hands, he gave it a light tap to the ground. “Then perhaps the Host should have been more explicit, like Illinois was. Dr. Edward Iplier is not to be touched or harmed, physically or through intimidation. If Google cannot abide by those demands then the Host will cease threatening.”

Google just stared angrily at the Host, but after a couple tense seconds, the android reabsorbed the nanites and Iplier scrambled up, racing for the Host. The android stood up, looking more frustrated and put out than angry. “I have some questions to ask him.”

“The Host asks why Google didn’t just start with that?”

The android’s mouth formed a thin line, “I don’t know how it’s possible that you became even more insufferable after you died. I told him I had to speak with him.”

“Did Google ask that before or after he threatened the Host’s doctor?” The Host demanded

“Creepiest way possible,” Dr. Iplier answered.

“Google may ask his questions if he keeps his hands off the doctor,” the Host warned.

Google seemed to be weighing his options, “Fine. Your last name is Iplier?”

“Yes?” Dr. Iplier motioned to the sewn on name on his white coat.

“What is your relationship with Dark?” Google asked.

“Illinois should have been smarter than this,” Host muttered quietly.

“I don’t have one, he’s a shady asshole and I’d rather choke on my own tongue than work for him,” Dr. Iplier informed.

“That can not possibly be true,” Google accused.

“It is,” Iplier told him. “I don’t know what you’re looking for.”

Google seemed frustrated, “I do not take kindly to information being withheld from me.”

“The Doctor is not your target, Google should leave to find his information elsewhere,” the Host ordered firmly.

“I am not leaving without information,” Google growled.

“What do you even want?” Dr. Iplier demanded. “I don’t have anything for you.”

“Your name is Iplier, and that name has a strong connection to Dark,” Google accused. “You have information on Egoton pre-1965.”

“Well, I’ve got shit for you, buddy,” Iplier snapped. “My mom married someone with that name, he was a mechanic, died at the age of forty.”

“Fine,” Google hissed, “if you will not give me the information I seek, I will take it elsewhere.”

Then the Host nudged for Iplier to step aside and Google stomped out, clearly furious. When he was gone, the doctor asked, “Is he actually looking for me?”

“No,” the Host answered. “Google has been following paper trails, and one of those strings he is trying to follow and mend leads to you.”

The doctor nodded, then he smiled, “Have you been threatening villains for me?”

With a couple careful words, the metal bat disappeared, and the Host sighed, “The criminal underworld would not hesitate to hurt the Host’s doctor to target the Host, or to take revenge against who they believe is the Author.”

Iplier leaned over and kissed the Host on the cheek, “Aren’t you adorable? Try not to get arrested.”

The Host smiled back, “The Host promises to keep his doctor safe.”

“Well while you’re here I’ll get your bandages changed,” Dr. Iplier decided, leading the Host out to a room where they could talk and Iplier could change his bandages again.


	24. Life and Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dark goes to make an impromptu visit, and finds an enemy nearby.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Grave

Mist rolled over an island in the middle of a lake, a lake that Dark had made sure every record has the altered name of White Ridge Lake. Mostly because it sounded completely different from its actual name. There sat a log cabin in the middle of some sparse woods, with a tunnel system that Dark didn’t currently know existed.

Every once in a while Dark made his way back to the island, when he could get away from his Network and his Lost Ones.

This island was where he mourned the fact that there were two empty graves here. Neither body had ever been found, and Dark had the graves protected by magic so they could not be found and disturbed. The two of them had suffered enough, and Dark didn’t want the only surviving memory of them to be vandalized.

Tonight the near-half moon offered its feeble light.

The one on the right read:

**DAMIEN DOOM**

**Loving brother**

**Life is ours to chose.**

The second one on the left read:

**CELINE DOOM**

**Loving sister and wife**

**A light in the darkness.**

Dark took a steadying breath. He usually just stood in mournful silence, but today he felt like he owed them something. Some respectful words, some dignity. There was little dignity left for the two of them, what with Celine’s body missing and her ex-husband running around doing who knows what with her brother’s body.

But what could he tell them that they wouldn’t already know? That Bim existed? About the Lost Ones? That Wil was a raving, adulterous madman with no regard for himself or those around him?

They already knew. What remained of the twins’ souls were ground up in Dark’s chimeric being. Sacrificed to both free the Entity and create Dark as he was now. They knew every victory Dark had wrestled from their city, every failure he had made them all suffer through.

A voice whispered right behind Dark’s left ear, something like a smoky aura curling around his shoulders, _“Maybe if you cried it would look more pathetic.”_

Dark force and looked around, a name burning like caustic acid on his tongue, “Marc.”

Anger and rage was all he felt as the world seemed to constrict on just the Entity and the Actor. Black mist with red whisps running through it he slipped deeper into the forest. The Actor’s voice seemed to bounce and echo off the trees.

At a full sprint, Dark charged through the woods, throwing his aura and splintering the trunks of trees as he tried to hit the Actor. To repay him for the pain and suffering that he had wrought upon the Actor.

Each time he struck he was ever so close, but yet never hit his target more than a glancing blow. The Actor nicked the Entity occasionally, but much like Dark never hit his target.

But unlike the Entity, the Actor’s blows were calculated.

Some time into the chase, Dark still just as much in a blind rage as when he began, felt his whole body freeze with one simple line.

“The Entity comes to a halt where he stands as the Actor’s voice fades away,” the Host forced.

“I almost had him!” Dark shouted at the Host, quickly shaking the Host’s aura off of him and preparing to race after the Actor’s train but the Host physically stepped in the way.

“By chance does the Entity know how long he has been pursuing the Actor?” The Host demanded, trying to keep himself in the Entity’s direct line of sight. The early sun’s rays glistening off the bloody bandages.

“I don’t care!” Dark raged, his aura whirling around him, cutting into tree trunks and bushes like sharp blades.

Dark took two steps, moving around the Host to give chase again.

The Host’s aura followed down from him like his coat had a long train coming down from his back, blood seeping from his bandages and soaking completely. “And the Entity succumbed to his accrued injuries and for him, all went black,” the Host spoke, and reality bent a knee to his will.

Dark instantly crashed to the ground, his consciousness checking out and when he woke up in his home office, laying on the couch, he was aware of how much the body he was inhabiting ached and almost burned in pain.

“Host,” Dark seethed, trying to get up but his exhausted body. “How dare you.”

“Twelve hours,” the Host said, he was sitting next to Dark in Dark’s personal chair, blood trailing down his face. “The Entity was chasing the Actor around that island for twelve hours.”

Some thing, maybe Dark’s blue soul, seemed to refocus. Twelve hours? Impossible it must have been . . .

“Yes,” the Host reminded. “The Entity probably hasn’t realized that parts of his suit are ripped.”

Dark looked down at himself and realized that his suit was all ripped up, spattered with mud and dirt. His inside pocket was completely ripped up. To the point where if his black ledger had been in there, it would have been easily lost, or worse stolen.

“Does—” Dark started.

“Still safe, the Actor only succeeded in wasting both his time and the Entity’s time,” the Host intercepted the words about to leave Dark’s mouth.

“Well then,” Dark used his magic and aura to switch his suit for a clean, undamaged one. He groaned a bit as he forcefully blocked himself up. “I have to go and find him.

“The Entity should do no such thing,” the Host reminded sharply. “The Actor has already retreated, the Entity will not find him.”

“I could if I had some help,” Dark growled, his body already protesting being back on its feet.

“The Host does not know where the Actor goes when he is uninvolved, and if the Host forced the Actor back into action people would die,” the Host refused. “The odds are not in the Host or the Entity’s favor.”

Dark let out an angry growl but the Host was right. The city would move on with its day, unaware of the bullet it had all collectively dodged.

The Actor would leave his plotting and schemes for another day.


	25. Cobwebs and Cardboard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kay goes with some of the guys to a haunted house, one of those Halloween attraction ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Haunted

With Halloween so close, Egoton was in a bit of a mood and there were more than a couple attractions and haunted houses we’re going up.

The plan was for Ethan and Randall to take Eric but one thing led to another and the two were with Eric, and Illinois, and King. The latter had heard Illinois had tagged along with Eric and wanted to be there _“just in case”._

The five of them were standing in front of what Ethan had found was the best rated haunted house in town.

Eric was hiding behind Illinois, looking up at it nervously, he was clutching his hand.

“What’s wrong, _leoncito,_ you’ve faced scarier,” Illinois smiled at him.

“There’s people in there,” Eric complained into Illinois’s back.

Illinois’s smile fell and he wrapped and arm around Eric, “You don’t have to go in. We can stay outside, try to win some prizes or something.”

“You make out in the bushes and I’m getting a crow to throw food at you Ills,” King warned.

“Hey, come on, what did I do to you?” Illinois demanded.

“Really?” King stared at him. “I’ve been keeping track. You want my list, asshat?”

Illinois rolled his eyes, and quickly bent down to carry Eric over his shoulder, but Eric went about as straight as a board so the result was Eric bracing his hands on Illinois’s shoulders. Eric’s face went beet red and Illinois had this huge smile on his face.

“What’ll it be _dulcito_? The fake haunted house or do I get a head start on that huge stuffed unicorn at the front?”

Eric went impossibly redder, just staring at Illinois.

Illinois chuckled.

“I think his brain shut down,” Ethan teased.

“Yeah?” Illinois carefully put Eric back on his feet, “fine, I’ll put the pretty boy down.”

He bent his knees a little and inclined his head so that their eyes were level. “Let those thoughts in that pretty head come back up.” Then he winked.

“Oi, we’re still here,” King shouted at him. “How about you do that away from me.”

“Illy!” Eric squeaked out, covering his face.

“Okay, okay,” Illinois stood up straight again. “I’ll stop. So what’ll it be sweetheart. Haunted house or cute games?”

“Y-Y-ou wa-nna go,” Eric looked away, still flustered but clearly uncomfortable.

“Any fun I could have isn’t worth it if you’re not okay,” Illinois reminded. “So are we going to counter-scam a carnie or go into the haunted house?”

Eric was quiet for a long time, looking uneasy and playing with his hands a bit. Illinois just waited trying to look as calm and patient as possible.

It took a bit but Eric worried his lower lips with his teeth, looking away. “We . . . uh, um . . . can go into the h-ouse.”

“You sure?” Illinois asked. “We don’t have to.”

“I-I w-want to,” Eric looked more determined.

Illinois kissed Eric’s cheek, “If you ever want to leave, just give me a sign and I’ll take you back out, even if we’re about to finish.”

“I wi-ll,” Eric promised.

“Okay,” Illinois kissed Eric’s forehead and passed him a couple twenties. “Go with the boys get us three tickets.”

“I can pay for myself,” King told him.

“아빠 would never let me hear the end of it,” Illinois told King.

Eric nodded and walked off with Ethan and Randall to a ticket stall outside the haunted house. Leaving Illinois and King standing away from them.

“So, you tell the Old Man yet?” King asked as the two of them just watched the former apprentices getting tickets.

“He knows I’ve got a new travel partner,” Illinois admitted. “The invoices show there are two people on his bills so I couldn’t just lie about that.”

“Why not tell him?” King said. “You’re obviously over the moon about him.”

“Don’t want my luck to run out,” Illinois defended, looking at Eric. “The long I wait, the longer my luck holds out.”

King frowned, “Haven’t you found some amulet that counteracts it by now?”

Illinois sighed, “There is no counter-curse, no spell, no lucky charm that is enough when my luck finally runs out. I can only hope that when it runs out again that Eric isn’t with me.”

“Do you think it ran out when I was sent to watch Artie?” King voiced a question he had for a while now.

“Dark and Host don’t blame me, but I do,” Illinois answered.

King was quiet for a second or two before tugging on his arm, “It wasn’t, your fault. There was nothing you could have done.”

Then before Illinois could argue further, King shoved him a bit, “Come on, let’s catch up with the guys, before they get themselves into trouble.”

Illinois smiled and they walked over to the others.

“Keep taking care of Eric and we won’t have any problems,” King told Illinois, “he’s a nice kid.”

“Huh, what was that?” Ethan said, looking over them.

“I said Illy’s a piece of shit,” King corrected. “Long may he reign, the prince of assholes.”

Illinois chuckled, rolling his eyes. The adventurer wrapped an arm around Eric’s back and leaned in. “Had fun at the ticket booth, _dulcito_?”

Eric just shrugged, staring at Illinois.

They headed into the haunted house, the result was that Eric stayed clutched to Illinois’s side for most of the time, almost stumbling as he was startled. Illinois asking if he wanted to leave a couple of times, but Eric just clung to him and insisted on continuing. Illinois did wind up picking him and carrying him halfway through, promising to protect him.

Ethan and Randall were having fun, giggling and chuckling the whole way through. King was the only one who didn’t have a noticeable reaction for most of it. He occasionally jumped and there was a room that Illinois and King stared into the room in surprise and with a bit of trepidation. It was a room with a mad doctor and slabs of meat and realistic fake skeletons. They glanced between each other and just sprinted into the next room.

But the group walked out the other side and Illinois raced for a bench to put Eric down, trying to calm him down. Thankfully he wasn’t in a panic attack. The two were talking between each other quietly and there was a gentle promise that Eric would not go to another haunted house.

They went to go get some corn dogs after Eric felt like walking again.

“Sorry you didn’t have fun,” Ethan apologized to King.

“What?” King asked in confusion, munching on the contents of a bag of popcorn.

“At the haunted house,” Ethan clarified.

“Oh,” King realized. “Nah, I had fun, it was alright.”

“Yeah, but yah didn’t get scared,” Randall reminded.

King shrugged, “There’s nothing really scary about a fake haunted house. Yeah I got startled a couple of times, and that effect with the fake organs did make me do a double take but it’s all cobwebs and cardboard.”

“We technically lived in a haunted house anyways,” Illinois told them, tipping his hat up.

“Wait you lived in the Manor, man?” Randall asked.

“Yep,” Illinois popped the _“p”_ on the end. “It got freaky at night. Never had to have a curfew.”

“How bad was it?” Ethan asked leaning forward.

King glared at Illinois, “Usually nothing happened except for the changing hallways, it took forever for me to find the bathroom at night when I first got there. It’s really easy to find the back porch, impossible to find anything else.”

Illinois tapped King’s arm with the back of his hand, “What about that time in the attic?”

“Which time in the attic?” King asked.

“You know when you and Yan came crying down the stairs?” Illinois told him.

_“Ohhhh,”_ King remembered, and smiled. “Huddle up.”

Randall dropped his elbows on the table, Ethan had a huge smile on his face.

“Okay, how old were we, Ills,” King started.

“It must have been about a year and some change since we were adopted,” Illinois waived his hand. Eric was halfway onto his lap, trying to cuddle up next to Illinois.

“So I was about seven, Yan was about six, and it was hot as balls in the middle of the summer. It was that one year with the heat wave and it was so hot that even the Manor was overheating. So Yan and I were up in attic, because we can’t go in the basement.”

“Why?” Eric managed to ask.

King sighed, “Because Dark kills people down there, it’s like Wil’s set couch, we just don’t go there unless you’re helping kill people, so I never went in the basement. Anyways we’re we’re fucking around in the attic and Yan was in Bim’s old crib and I was checking out this broken cursed looking mirror when I look over and I see Dark standing in a corner of the attic watching us. He’s in this nice red tux and he’s smiling at me. Except his smile is kinda freaking me out.”

King’s smile faded. “So I call out, _‘Mr. Dark?’_ ‘Cause I used to be formal with him. And down the stairs I hear footsteps and Dark calls out, _‘What is it Kay?’_ I look back at _‘Dark’_ and he’s gone. The real Dark is walking up the stairs. After I asked him about it, we’re taken out of the attic and he locked us out of the attic for a month. He spent the rest of the day watching us like a hawk and the next time I went up with Illy, the attic is clear of ghosts”

“So what was it?” Randall asked.

King shrugged.

“Yanc called him _‘the Shadow Man’_ cause he has all this black smoke around him,” Illinois answered. “Dark always got super protective when he was around so we always assumed he was one of those bad spirits.”

“Like Dark?” Ethan asked.

Illinois made a scoffing sound, “Dark’s a demon, big difference. Spirits can’t affect their environments, demons are way more dangerous. Either way whenever the Shadow Man was in a part of the house Dark would throw a barrier up and we couldn’t go in that part of the house until Dark deemed it safe. Once we were barred from going outside without him watching over us for a month. Artie and Bim went insane, it was fun to watch.”

“For you,” King grumbled.

“So is that thing still around the Manor?” Ethan asked.

“Don’t know why he wouldn’t be,” King answered. “Maybe Dark pissed him off and he’s haunting Dark. I don’t know, I’ve tried looking into him and so far I’ve found nothing. But that doesn’t mean I’ve given up.”

“So has he done anything to you guys, stood over your bed as you slept, or fucked with the lights?” Ethan asked.

“Not to us,” King reported. “I haven’t seen or heard anything to suggest it’s a demon or a poltergeist. Glad I moved out, that mess is your problem.” He nudged Illinois.

“No,” Illinois smiled. “I don’t get the cursed mansion, I get the cursed lake house. Big difference. The Shadow Man doesn’t live there. Bim gets to deal with the cursed mansion, I don’t want anything to do with that cursed house besides my stuff. Bim can have the house.”

“B-im in-herits the M-Manor?” Eric asked. “But Da-rk can’t die?”

Illinois shrugged, “Didn’t stop him from making a will, I think he does it to make himself feel better, or maybe the Old Man’s gonna skip town for a hundred years to add some pizazz to his life, I don’t know.”

“Weird,” Ethan commented.

“That will isn’t getting used anytime soon,” Illinois excused. He stood up and held out an elbow for Eric. “Now if you’ll excuse us, boys, we have some carnival games to win.”

Eric blush returned as he grabbed onto Illinois’s arm. Illinois helped him up and they walked away.

The other three watched them walk away. Ethan getting up, “Well I’m gonna have fun on some of those rides.”

“Wanna go stalk an’ torment the lovebirds?” Randall smiled at King.

“Why do you think I’m here?” King smiled, they split ways to enjoy the rest of the festivities.


	26. Heart to Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s one of those nights, the “I gotta go fish Wil out of a ditch” type of nights.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Cold  
> Darkstache with hurt Wil for 👉🏼👈🏼😭 anon on tumblr.

Wilford didn’t know when he had started drinking, but the world was tipsy. More so than usual. Things made even less sense than normal.

He might have flirted with a cute looking young lad and gotten punched out by his boyfriend. But it was all fun and games.

Dark had caught wind of Wil’s antics and pulled him from a fight outside the bar Wilford had been drinking like a madman. Dark had stabbed the man for touching Wil and pulled him through a portal and almost shoved him onto the bed.

“I had him on the ropes,” Wilford grumbled, his words coming out more slurred than usual.

“Just because you’re invincible doesn’t mean you have to be insufferable about it,” Dark grumbled and with a snap of his fingers Wil’s clothing changed to his usual sleepwear. Which mostly consisted of his pink sweatpants.

Wilford groaned and blinked in disorientation before he looked up and with a calm smile he asked, “Dames, did you do something with your hair, ol’ sport?”

Dark took a steadying sigh, closing his eyes for a bit.

“I like it, very devilish,” Wil smiled at him, still drunk, still mad, but only less so tonight. “You come to join me?”

“I still have a lot of work to do,” Dark didn’t think he could deal with Wil tonight if he was semi-sane. It had been a bit of a tough month for him. Dealing with the tattered remains of William seemed especially cruel of the universe to expect of him tonight.

“Bah,” Wilford grinned, getting up on his forearms and looking up at Dark. His eyes like warm chocolate pools. “You know the saying:  _ all work and no play makes Damesy a dull boy _ .”

Dark watched him for a couple seconds before sitting next to him. He reminded Wil in a sharp tone, “You smell drunk.”

“Yay,” Wilford lunged for Dark. Since Wil was drunk, Dark could have easily moved out of the way but the Entity just let Wil pull him into an awkward lying position. The madman was hugging Dark like an oversized stuffed animal.

“I’ll stay until you go to sleep,” Dark told him, despite the fact that telling Wilford anything when he was in one of these states was pointless.

“You’re so cold, Dames,” Wil complained, as if Dark hadn’t even spoken. “Let’s warm up under the covers.”

“It’s mid-autumn, of course you’re cold,” Dark reminded, ignoring the screaming his own soul was doing. “You just want me to have sex with you.”

“Wouldn’t be so bad,” Wilford smiled, pulling Dark even closer. “You could dismiss that noisy butler of yours.”

“You’re only going to fall asleep halfway through and I’m going to be the one to deal with it,” Dark refused.

Wil huffed out but whatever he was saying was lost in Dark’s chest. He did pick up his head and asked, “Can I just lay on your chest? The sound of your heartbeat always helps calm me down?”

Dark’s twin souls screamed a bit, but he ran a hand through Wil’s hair and said, “If you want to. Are you alright?”

Wilford snuggled closer onto Dark’s chest, “I just . . . I’m sorry.”

“For what?” Dark didn’t stop carding his hand through his hair.

“I dunno,” Wil’s hug tightened, almost desperately. “I can’t remember, but nothing heals like a good apology, right?”

“Well I forgive you,” Dark told him, Wilford not letting go of him in the slightest. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“I have,” Wil sounded like he was crying as he held Dark so tight he would have been bruising his ribs. “I hurt you so bad. I don’t know how, but I know I did.”

Dark remembered Wil’s laughter echoing through the hall as he called to his dead friends. He remembered abandoning William to his madness, leaving the man to the crushing Void that had devoured his mind in chunks. William had died a slow death, and the body Wilford had inherited kept moving

“Wil, you didn’t do anything,” Dark tried to tell him. “I . . . I . . .”

“You need to see a doctor, Dames,” Wilford rubbed the side of his head to Dark’s chest. “I can barely hear your heart. Hope you’re not paying that stuffed shirt to make you sick.”

“Wil,” Dark tried again.

“Someone would think you had died,” Wilford chuckled drowsily.

Something in Dark’s twin souls cracked, he should tell him. Either way he wouldn’t remember, the Entity could come clean and tell Wilford what had happened. Get what the Entity expected to be fury and heartbreak over with. “Wil, I  _ am _ dead.”

Wilford let out a soft but mad cackle, clinging somehow even tighter to Dark. He was clearly getting sleepier. “Good one . . . you and your jokes, Dames. Always tell . . . best ones.”

Dark grew quiet, carding his fingers through Wil’s hair, watching him slowly drift off. Their auras tangled together even after he had fallen asleep.

Silently Dark pulled himself away, Wilford complaining in his sleep but he quieted down after Dark knelt down to kiss him on the forehead.

Wil’s mustache twitched and he curled around Dark’s pillow.

Dark’s hand lingered on Wil’s head, words swirled around in Dark’s head:  _ “I love you, Wil. I love you so much I would destroy this city for you. I would give anything and do anything for you.” _

But Dark found the words stuck in his throat, and Wilford was not conscious to hear them with his abilities.

So Dark pulled the sheets over Wilford and went back to his criminal empire, trying to stop the pain in his wounded heart. Or at least lessen it.

In the morning Wilford would make no mention of the nightly exchange. Therefore Dark would assume he had forgotten about it entirely.


	27. A Father’s Blessing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dark and Iplier have that long overdue chat, and the Host is expectedly not very happy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Ghost  
> For Dr. Iplier’s birthday. I cheated with this one, in that the Host is almost like a ghost in terms of the Author, in that he is what remains.

Dr. Iplier was busy trying to patch the Jim’s up. They had been tailing a news story. It wasn’t the first time Iplier, Henrik, or some other unfortunate doctor had done their darkest to patch one of the Jims up. In typical Jim fashion they were almost impossible to keep still, you couldn’t separate a Jim pair or trio up lest things get worse if one Jim was left bored and unsupervised, and the Jim or Jims being treated always claimed this was their first visit to the hospital.

Iplier was pretty sure the latter was impossible, that he had to have treated this particular Jim before, but he’d given up trying to reason with a living force of nature.

“Alright,” Iplier stepped back from the Jim he was treating, who had broken his leg in some accident. The doctor offered up some crunches. “Now I know it’s hard for you but try not to do anything too drastic. You need six to eight weeks to heal.”

“Oh I can just get Jim to cover my shift,” R.J, one of the only Jims that Iplier seemed to be able to identify, smiled and was kicking back and forth his good leg.

C.J, a camera Jim, smiled, “Ooh, he is a good Jim for the task.”

“Just make sure you stay off the leg,” Iplier told him with a promise that he knew probably wouldn’t be honored and he’d have to fix whatever new injury had cropped up.

And after dealing with the Jim’s, Iplier noticed he was done for a day. It was an early day for him. He was excited to spend the rest of his evening with the Host and his friends.

But as he walked out to head to his car, he saw the Host sitting right outside the entrance, and when the door opened Iplier noticed that he looked a bit worried.

“You okay, did something happen?” Iplier asked, glancing around but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

“No, the Host and the others are unharmed,” the Host answered, but he stopped looking in the doctor’s direction, he seemed nervous.

“Host, whatever happened, it’s okay,” Iplier walked over to kneel next to him.

“The Entity wishes to meet with the Host’s doctor, and he has been incredibly insistent about the matter,” the Host told him. “The Host’s first instinct is to deny the Entity. The Host and Iplier’s relationship is none of the Entity’s concern.” 

“So you don’t want to go?” Iplier asked in concern.

“The Host,” Host made a disgruntled, frustrated noise. “The Host does not want the Entity to . . . disapprove. The Host’s doctor is perfect but the Entity has high standards.”

“Oh,” Iplier commented, instantly regretting not saying more immediately. “Well if you don’t want to go then we don’t have it.”

“The Entity will only keep insisting, the only reason that the Entity has not approached Eric is because of Illinois luck,” the Host reported. “The Host does not have that power.”

“Can I hold your hands?” Iplier asked.

“Dr. Iplier can always hold the Host’s hands,” the Host smiled.

“I know, but I don’t want to startle you by grabbing you,” Iplier promised, gently taking his hands. “If you don’t want to go, we’ll go back to the base and stay there.”

The Host paused to think about it, clutching Iplier’s hands. “The Host wants to get this over with.”

“I love you,” Dr. Iplier told him. “And just because your old man happens to be an asshole of a mob boss, won’t make me stop loving you.”

Smiling, the Host leaned in a bit closer, “The Host loves Dr. Iplier as well. He only wishes that he could tell his doctor that directly.”

“You tell me in lots of ways,” Iplier reminded. “It’s okay, do you still want to go?”

“The outing won’t be entirely unpleasant,” the Host evaded.

“But do you _want_ to go?” Iplier insisted.

“No, but this discussion needs to happen,” the Host decided and stood up as a tinted black car drove up. Host didn’t let go of Iplier’s hand. The driver’s side window rolled down. The man looked a bit nervous.

It was at that moment that Iplier focused his attention away from Host’s face and onto what the Host was wearing. Instead of some random shirt he had found, he was in a nicer dress shirt and a pair of dress slacks.

“Author?” The driver asked, clearly almost as uncomfortable as he was fearful.

“The Host,” the Host corrected.

“Right, right,” the driver corrected nervously. “The boss told me to pick you up.”

The Host used his voice and his sight to open the door. “Dr. Iplier should get in first.”

Iplier got in and the Host followed him in. The car drove off and the Host pulled a divider up to isolate the two of them. The drive wasn’t too long but the drive brought him to Dark’s favorite restaurant. The Host walked them in and Iplier noticed that most of the restaurant staff gave Host a wide berth. As if they were afraid of being hit or attacked by him. The Host just led Dr. Iplier past the hostess without even pausing to talk to her or letting Iplier slow down.

Upstairs there was a table that was lower to the floor and there were just cushions on the floor. Dark was sitting there, and he looked over at them. He didn’t say anything, and Iplier knew he did not look happy.

Host led Iplier over to sit down on the other side of the table, the Host sat on Iplier’s right, in-between the two men. There were already menus in front of them.

“Doctor,” Dark greeted through clenched teeth. Then he turned to the Host and in a much less confrontational tone asked, “What do you want? Going to try to order a burger here, or do you have more sense than Arthur?”

“That’s nonsense,” the Host scoffed. “This restaurant doesn’t sell burgers. The Host will have the ginseng chicken soup, and a Diet Coke.”

“Really?” Dark sounded surprised. “You really do have a different pallet. Good, Arthur always worried me about his diet.”

“I can’t read a word of this,” Iplier warned, the menu was purely in Korean.

“Dr. Iplier actually would like the bulgogi, and an iced tea,” the Host answered for Iplier.

“Ohhh, there are drink labels on here,” Iplier realized.

Dark collected their menus, and slipped a note in Korean through a small portal. Then, as if Iplier wasn’t even there, Dark asked, “Why their doctor?”

“Why is the Entity sleeping with a madman?” Host asked in return.

“He’s a bit old for you,” Dark reminded.

“Hmm,” the Host’s face bunched up a little, “and how much older is the Entity than the Madman?”

“Hhnn,” Dark hummed, leaning his chin on his palm and resting it on the table. “Touché. You have me there.”

“I’m right here,” Iplier told them, a little frustrated.

“Hush, I’ll be with you in a moment,” Dark dismissed.

“It’s not like the Host is trailing dangerous men and needs to be watched like Yan,” Host defended. “Maybe the Entity should stop his daughter before she dates someone who should actually hurt her.”

One of the waiters came in with their drinks, his eyes bouncing between the three of them and Dark silently dismissed her to the young lady’s obvious relief.

After a little bit of a standoff where Iplier and his relationship with the Host were the only topics, Dark finally turned to Iplier. His finger tracing along the rim of his tea cup.

“You realize that none of this is exceptionally personal towards you,” Dark told him. “You only keep people alive who range from a mild inconvenience to exceptionally insulting. But should you ever harm the Host I will skin you alive, inch by inch, and feed your soul to hellhounds.”

Iplier’s eyes widened, “Wasn’t planning on it.”

“Good,” Dark took a sip of his tea. “The Host has more than suffered enough, and I will not stand by and allow anyone to harm him.”

“Something we can both agree to,” Iplier promised.

“I expect Host’s medical records, immediately,” Dark told him as their food came in.

“He’s not a minor, so no,” Iplier told him, and the waiter looked terrified at the exchange.

Dark hummed, “I hate being told no, but I like you protecting Host so I’ll allow it.”

Iplier had to admit he did like the food, he wound up eating some of Host’s soup and Host snuck off some of Iplier’s beef. The rest of the evening was free of threats for the most part. Dark was less hostile than he was initially.

Host led him out, a stride or two ahead of Iplier and was talking to the driver that had initially brought them to the restaurant.

Iplier didn’t catch the conversation but when Iplier reached them the Host turned to him. “The driver will return the Host’s doctor, the Host will stay with the Entity for a while and will join the doctor in a half-hour.”

“Alright,” Iplier glanced around. “Stay safe, alright?”

“Of course the Host will,” the Host promised.

With a goodbye kiss, Iplier finally got into the car and it slowly drove off with the doctor as the only passenger.

The drive was quiet for a bit and Iplier felt so awkward that he was actually checking his phone because there was literally nothing to do. The driver kept occasionally glancing at him nervously.

“You look like you’ve swallowed a frog,” Iplier met his eyes in the rear view mirror briefly before the driver looked away.

“Can I ask a question?” the driver asked, sounded a bit uneasy.

“Sure,” Iplier allowed.

“So how did you meet him? You work with the heroes too?” The driver asked.

“Yes, I’m not at liberty to talk about my patients, but I met the Host on an operating table,” Iplier admitted. “We’ve been close ever since.”

“Huh,” the driver responded, but didn’t offer a secondary comment.

“Host told me word was getting out about our relationship,” Iplier tried to change the topic just a bit. “I wasn’t aware he could still part a crowd.”

“Well, and you don’t have to answer it, but word gets out,” the guy began, “and you’re dating the Auth— I mean the Host, and he’s terrifying. So everyone just assumes you are too.”

That gave Iplier pause. He’d never thought that the reason he hadn’t been attacked by someone from the criminal underworld was because they were scared of him.

“Oh,” Iplier commented, unsure if he should admit that he wasn’t dangerous or not. Eventually he decided to say, “Well I don’t have any reason to hurt you.”

The driver seemed to relax, “Thank you, Sir.”

The car stopped in front of the heroes’ base. “My car was still at the hospital.”

“I was instructed to take you back to the base,” the driver sounded nervous.

“Well then one of those two can portal my car back here, because I need to go to work tomorrow,” Iplier shrugged and the driver sounded like he was choking on his own tongue.

“You okay?” Dr. Iplier’s hand froze on the door handle, he turned to look at him.

“Were you referring to the Demon Dark or the Host?” The driver asked hesitantly.

“Probably Dark since he doesn’t bleed from the eyes when he uses the Void,” Iplier answered.

His driver chuckles a bit, “You’ve got balls of steel, Sir.”

Unsure how to answer that he shrugged. To be fair with everything he’d seen by this point, he either did have balls of steel, or outrageous professional apathy. So the comment was warranted. “Guess I do.”

Then he thanked the man and got out, walking into the base. His car was already there and he could enjoy the rest of the evening with the Host and his friends.


	28. Phantoms of the Old World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In an undisclosed location there is a vault where a powerful group keeps “troublesome” relics. Nate and Mare have to go in, and play a little game of pretend. If they play their cards right, Nate gets to walk back out with Mare. If they don’t, they’re both in quite a bit of trouble. But there is more to fear than hooded figures and hard-to-find places. Things that time is trying to bury and forget . . . the phantoms of the old world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Fear  
> A/N: Birthday post for Mare.

They had been in the car for a long time, and normally Nate wouldn’t have minded. If this was an ordinary car trip he was forced to sit passenger on, he would have been on his phone, or writing another song or cover.

But this was no ordinary car trip. He was out in the middle of what he thought was the desert, interrupted from his tour, but promised he’d meet up with them at the next stop, with a black bag over his head to block out the possibility of him seeing where he was going. The only positive was that he was allowed music to keep him and Mare from going insane.

And that was part of the problem, Mare was with him. Normally he would have let Mare slip away, pretend they didn’t know each other and Nate would sit and be fine.

However Nate and Mare had to play of game of pretend. They had to pretend that Nate was completely in control of Mare. That Mare couldn’t and didn’t get away from him. Pretend that there wasn’t a slowly but surely founded bond of trust between the two of them.

Around Nate’s neck was a necklace with a fake metal key dangling around it. In the head was a large amethyst that seemed to faintly glow. Mare was inside the necklace, hiding and trying not to look like he could get out if he casually stretched.

They had to sell this perfectly. So far Mare had already passed a couple tests before Nate had gotten into the car, and things seemed to be going alright.

But now it was dark and the car’s heater was almost silently going in the background. All Nate could do was hope and pray that Mare didn’t go completely crazy in boredom. He didn’t want Mare taken away, Nate liked Mare. The demon wasn’t half as bad as Anti and nowhere near as devious as Dark.

But to this group a demon was a demon, and they would believe Nate had been taken over. So they couldn’t afford to mess this up.

Mercifully the car stopped and the bag came off.

Nate blinked in disorientation, taking his ear buds out. “We here?”

“Yeah,” the driver got out as the guy next to Nate opened the car door.

“This gonna take long? I’ve got a tour to get back to,” Nate got out, putting his phone in his pocket.

“Shouldn’t take more than a half-an-hour,” the driver promised.

There was what looked like a decommissioned aircraft hangar surrounded by a gated fence, runes and protection seals all over the place. It wasn’t meant to keep humans out, that’s what the desert was for, it was to keep out other dangerous creatures.

Nate was greeted by five people in robes, “Ahh, Young Nathan, we hoped you’d join us properly. Make sure you leave that thing in the vault and get changed. We have a lot to talk about.”

“I still have a concert to get back to and I’m not done using his aura,” Nate pretended to be a lot colder towards Mare than he ever had been, but he still took off the necklace. Mare tried to be as still as possible as he was placed inside an ornate but non-magical box.

He could still hear the conversation as he was slowly taken away.

“And I’m not wearing those robes, you all look like cultists,” Nate refused.

“We’re not cultists,” the leader insisted, as they got farther away and Mare fought the urge to rush to Nate’s side. Nate wasn’t extremely magically inclined like Dark’s host or Marvin. He had a nice voice and was sensitive to magic, but otherwise defenseless against those who wanted to harm him.

But Mare had to trust Nate, that he knew these people, that they only wanted to harm Mare if he showed he couldn’t be contained.

A gnawing unease that felt worse when he was taken into a room and could feel other twisted, tormented souls inside the room. Locked and sealed inside of various objects. Because Mare wasn’t locked inside the necklace, he could sense around the room. There was a sealed book holding a demon that wouldn’t stop screaming. A music box with a banshee locked inside. A mask. A couple more necklaces each with a demon inside the centerpiece gemstone. A statue with a weeping demon.

But at the other side of the room, locked inside of a glass case, tethered onto place with chains and papers written with all kinds of runes was a black cane, the pommel head of the cane was a three talon claws hand holding a clear gem.

And the demon inside that cane . . . it was _staring_ at him.

Mare didn’t want to be in here, he could feel the screams of other demons and spirits trapped in this room. It was like if you stuck a human into a room with the sick and dying, and then closed the door behind them.

_“Well,”_ a voice rumbled out and the other demons immediately fell silent. _“That’s not fair.”_

The other demons seemed to echo the one in the cane, with almost a mad fervor.

_“Not fair . . .”_

_“Not fair . . .”_

_“Not fair . . .”_

_“Not fair . . .”_

_“Not fair . . .”_

_“Enough!”_ The demon called out and they _immediately_ fell silent. _“You have a name?”_

“Oh, I don’t trust you,” Mare defended.

Mare could almost hear the smile when the demon asked, _“So you’re not an idiot? How about this: you help get me out, and I don’t tell them you’re not under your host’s thumb?”_

Mare felt a tight coil in his soul, “I’ll see what I can do.”

_“The longer I wait little parrot, the more impatient I get,”_ the demon warned.

“Okay, okay,” Mare allowed. “I got it.”

Then the door opened and Mare went quiet. Mare didn’t think any real time had passed, but that might have been the droning of tortured souls warping his perception of time. His box was picked up and removed and in a minute or two the box was opened and Mare felt relief wash over him as Nate put the necklace back on.

“I’ll definitely keep an eye on the situation,” Nate promised the leader. “Figure out of it’s really them.”

“I’d like to know how bad the situation is,” they told Nate. “Make sure you tell us if the demon you have becomes unmanageable.”

“Of course,” Nate agreed, “safety first.”

Mare did his best to stay quiet and still, Nate had his head covered, but this time it was just Nate and the driver.

When the driver was concentrating on the road, Mare clung to Nate’s neck.

“Hey, buddy, calm down,” Nate whispered as quietly as he could.

Mare felt like a coiled spring, waiting for everything to fall through. But to Mare’s relief they rendezvoused back with the tour group and Mare flew out of the necklace the instant the van started driving away.

“Hey, come on, you don’t have to go back for a while,” Nate promised, everything’s okay.”

“They’ve got an evil bastard in there,” Mare warned. “He just threatened to expose us.”

“Okay, you tell me and I tell you,” Nate told him.

“We were in assfuck north Arizona,” Mare reported.

“Alright,” Nate nodded. “They don’t suspect anything right now, so we’ve got some time. Which demon was it?”

“He was in a cane, that fucker had the whole cell under his thumb,” Mare warned.

“Shit, okay,” Nate swore, his hand forming a claw. “Did the top have a claw and a marble in the claw.”

“Yes.”

“Dammit!” Nate yelled. “M’Kay, we can’t free him, that fucker needs to stay in his cage. We’ll think of something. We’ll do the tour and think of something.”

“Do I have to go back in the necklace?” Mare asked with a little bit of trepidation.

“No, there’s some hot wings in the kitchen unit,” Nate offered. “Have fun, buddy.”

“Sweet,” Mare let out his first smile he’d given Nate since he told Mare about the necklace trick.

“Make sure you save some for everyone else,” Nate told him, smiling back at Mare.

“Maybe if I feel like it,” Mare scoffed, still smiling.

The demon slipped through the door, Nate’s smile lingered a bit as he looked at the door. Then Nate turned back to the camera he had taken from the Sides, currently it was tied down with rope and spell tape. “Okay, now back to work.”


	29. Pumpkin Seeds for Henrik

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chase finds and interesting gift for Henrik one morning, and there’s only one guess who the gift giver is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Pumpkin

Chase was up and about, early morning for once, but unfortunately operating under less than five hours of sleep. Henrik and Iplier were talking at the common room table, drinking a coffee and getting ready for their day.

The drowsy marksman was stirring some sugar into his own coffee when two short, sharp alarms that something was knocking on the magical barrier outside the base, sounded out.

“If that’s Dark I’m gonna lose my shite,” Chase snapped.

Then he walked to the front door and opened it, expecting to see Dark, but the only thing outside the barrier was a singular pumpkin.

The pumpkin looked like it had been stabbed repeatedly and not a hint of precision was used to carve eyes, a nose and a janky-looking mouth into it. On the back it had the words _“FUCK”_ and _“HENRIK”_ on it, a big hole between the words. The giant knife that had been used to make the cuts sticking out of the top of the pumpkin.

Chase didn’t have to look at the pumpkin for more than two second to know Dark had nothing to do with this. It was Anti’s work of art he’d stabbed into life.

Groaning, Chase picked up the surprisingly heavy pumpkin and dragged it inside, kicking the door closed behind him.

“Hey Hein, delivery,” Chase announced as he came over and heaved it onto the table.

_“Scheiße!”_ Henrik swore, looking at the pumpkin. “Zat is an utter disaster.”

“Yikes, got an admirer, Hein?” Iplier joked.

“Zis is not funny,” Henrik commented. “This is ze fourth gift I have seen from zat glitch.”

“Ooh,” Iplier teased. “Is it getting serious then?”

“Nein,” Henrik spat. “He has been sending me dead animals, he clearly intends to kill me.”

“Yeesh, I should probably get the Host on it then,” Iplier sounded a bit less joking and more serious.

“Zank you,” Henrik growled, standing up and tipping back the rest of his coffee. “Now I have vork to do.”

Henrik left to go to work, and Jackie sped out to find Anti after helping Chase move the pumpkin out to the garage.

It took a long time for Jackie to find Anti. The glitch demon had been usually quiet, seeming to be on type of single-minded mission. The last time Anti had acted like this Bim had come into the world. But instead of illegal cloning, Anti was in the woods to the north of Egoton, hunting for something.

Jackie only found out because some hiker had almost bumped into Anti. The demon was covered in blood and didn’t seem to notice the hiker, or just didn’t care about them.

So the speedster began racing through forest roads until he heard a roar and instinctively went to go and check only to see Anti standing over a grizzly bear, grinning down at the downed creature.

“Picky fooker doesn’t like the rabbits, fine,” Anti hissed at the bear. “He’s gonna love yeh.”

Jackie just stood by and watched for a second as Anti heaved one of the limbs over his shoulder and with more strength than Jackie thought the glitch had, just casually began dragging the creature behind him.

He immediately noticed Jackie and grinned, “Hey Jack-off how’s it goin’?

When he finally found his voice, Jackie asked, “Anti, what’cha doin’ with that bear.”

“It’s fer Henrik,” Anti looked so proud of himself.

“How ‘bout yah doin’ give him the bear an’ stop givin’ him dead animals?” Jackie told him.

“How ‘bout yeh mind yer fookin’ business,” Anti glared at Jackie.

“Right, right,” Jackie dismissed pointedly. “Leave Hein alone, an’ we don’t have problems.”

Anti hissed at Jackie, dropping the bear and lunging for the speedster. By the end of the fight, Jackie had managed to keep Anti from what he thought was homicide, but the bear still found its way to Henrik. Henrik took one look at the bear, chugged a fifth of scotch, and went to bed early. Anti glaring in frustration at Jackie and Chase.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a missing word on that pumpkin that changes the context of Anti’s message entirely and I’ll let you guys come up what that word is


	30. The Pros and Cons of Siblings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Yancy saw Illinois again he was going to commit full on fratricide. He meant it this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Coffin  
> It the Heist anniversary! Which means it’s Magnum, Illinois and Yancyms birthday. So here’s a post.

When Yancy saw Illinois again he was going to commit full on fratricide.

Illinois had wanted to take Yancy out for their birthday. A nice evening that had turned into Illinois seeing something incredibly sketchy and racing in like its name was Eric Derekson.

Stuff like this is why Yancy and King rolled their eyes when people claimed Illinois was the responsible one.

This time, Yancy’s reason for wanting to punch Illinois in the face was caused by Illinois’s search down a sketchy alleyway, which led to an even sketchier tunnel through a bridge. The two of them had been subsequently ambushed by a group of nut jobs in cloaks.

Illinois had the good fortune not to get dragged off. But Yancy got dragged off to a basement and was forced to participate in the most half-assed ritual he’d ever seen. The ropes weren’t tied correctly, two of the guys looked high. He was looking at the magical lines they’d tried to draw, they’d be lucky to get something to even feel these idiots were trying to summon them. Which because of the fact that Nate lived three blocks over it might be Mare if he was in town.

“Can I’s go home already?” Yancy asked. “I’s was havin’ a good birthday.”

“Silence nonbeliever!” The leader shouted as two guys manhandled Yancy towards a coffin. “We shall bring our dark god back into the world, to bring his sweet bliss into the world.”

Yancy rolled his eyes and tried to pull away. “Lemme get my phone, an’ I’ll gives him a call.”

“In time you shall meet him in death,” the leader promised as a dark shadow moved through the darkness of the hallway leading into the room. The huge man had a black bushy bread and he quickly slammed I’m his fist to the back of the man’s head and he dropped like a rock.

The cultists scattered and immediately let go of Yancy to make their escape.

Yancy pulled up his fists, staring down someone who looked twice his size and easily three times his weight.

“Easy now, lad,” the man chuckled and offered out his hand. “I ain’t here ta hurt ye. Name’s Captain Magnum.”

“Yancy,” the ex-convict introduced, taking his hand and his hand just being enveloped by the pirate captain.

“Maggie! He alive?” Illinois raced in with a machete in hand, looking around wildly. “Oh, hey Yanc, nice coffin.”

“Fook off,” Yancy told him. “Youse owe me.”

“This be yer brother, Ills?” Magnum smiled, bent down to pick up the cult leader, holding him under his arm.

“Yeah, he’s my baby brother,” Illinois pinched Yancy’s cheek with his free hand.

Yancy batted him away, “Ger’off me, I’s just a year younger.”

“Well, if ye boys don’t be mindin’ me, this scallywag attacked me men, an’ we need ta have a chat wit’ him before we set sail again. Care ta join us boys?”

“Hell’s yeah,” Illinois sheathed his machete.

There was a loud clearing of the throat and all three of them turned to see Dark standing there, arms crossed, glaring at Illinois, as the fingers of one hand drummed angrily on his arm.

“Uh, hey Ol’ Man,” Illinois grinned.

“Grounded,” Dark told Illinois.

“What?” Illinois chuckled nervously.

“Go back to the heroes, Yancy,” Dark opened a portal right to the hero’s base. “I already delivered your gift there. I have to talk to your brother.”

“Have fun, Ills,” Yancy grinned and left, Dark let Magnum follow him through, leaving Illinois to Dark’s stern glower.

“Is he going ta be okay?” Magnum asked in concern.

“Oh yeah,” Yancy smiled. “He’ll spend the night doin’ boring ass paperwork and get off wit’ a slap on da wrist.

“Oh,” Magnum seemed to be less worried. “Well if ye want ta join us ta’morrow ye can.”

“I’s gonna just leave da adventurin’ ta Noisy, have fun though,” Yancy declined.

“A shame,” Magnum told him. The cultist groaned as he started to awake and thre captain left Yancy to go back inside.

Yancy as it turned out got a couple gift cards and some new athletic tape for his hands. Among Illinois’s gifts was not getting grounded for nearly as long as he should have.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yancy is not impressed by your half-assed black magic.


	31. Boil, Boil, Toil and Trouble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s the end of the spooky season and the heroes and villains met up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Happy Halloween

Another year passed, another year come and gone, and it was the heroes and the villains’ meet-up, one of their only truce days.

Several people weren’t there that normally came every year. Logan was understandably not in attendance and Joan and Virgil had stayed at the apartment with him as they watched _The Nightmare Before Christmas_ and the _Addams Family_ movies. Oliver had stayed at the base to avoid Google, a good idea since Google only came to see if Oliver was there. Chase had stayed with Oliver to avoid seeing Dark’s face. And Nate was out of town with Mare on a tour.

Still, the tenuous truce remained.

The Host had pulled Illinois and Bim aside briefly before they entered the building that the meet-up was being held at.

There was an important matter that the Host wanted to discuss and Dark was reassured everything was fine before he let them hang back and enter the festivities shortly after.

But everything was not fine.

“This is completely absurd,” Bim told him. “How are you sure this is even going to work?”

“The Host is only certain that without aid, he and the others will fail,” the Host admitted.

“So what are we supposed to do?” Illinois asked. “You’re a shit liar, how are you gonna get past Dark?”

“No,” the Host corrected. “The Host needs _Illinois_ to lie to the Entity. Because he is the only one who could get away with.”

Illinois groaned, rolling his eyes,”Fine, I’ll think of something but if he gets pissed I’m blaming your cryptic ass.”

“The Host is not opposed to that, so long as things are taken care of,” the Host smiled. “Now, the Host and his brothers should join the others. Before the Entity gets concerned and comes looking for them.”

“But I have questions,” Bim reminded.

“Not while prying eyes can find, the three of them talk tomorrow,” the Host promised.

Bim protested a bit but the Host helped the three of them slipped back into the group. They came into the room while Dark and King were in the middle of an argument.

“We can’t get a cat, Kay,” King snapped at Dark. Dark rolled his eyes. “We can’t get a dog, Kay. It’s not safe. It’ll die.”

Dark pinched the bridge of his nose, “Kaylor.”

“And then what do you do the instant I leave?” King spat. “You get a fucking cat! And name it after yourself!”

“Wil brought him into the house and named him, and the thing was half-dead,” Dark defended. “You would have been angrier if I had allowed it to die.”

Wilford chuckled from where he was sitting next to Dark, “You know you love ol’ Damsy, Dark. The little scamp always tries to sleep in our bed.”

“Don’t undermine me in front of everyone,” Dark glared at Wil.

The madman just smiled at Dark, loudly scooting his chair closer. “Let’s just enjoy the party. Have a couple drinks with me.”

“I’m not done complaining at him,” King pointed at Dark.

Wilford was suddenly standing next to King, slinging an arm around his neck. “Come on my boy, you like bourbon right?”

“Not really,” King told him, glancing at Abe. “I wasn’t old enough to drink when I left.”

“Ahh, I know you and Illy stole some of Dark’s wine on multiple occasions,” Wil smiled.

“What was that?” Dark demanded.

“Nothing,” Illinois told him. “I’m getting a drink.”

Google had been watching the argument from a distance, and he noticed that Bing was walking up to him.

“Hey, Googs,” Bing greeted when he stopped next to the other android. “We need to talk.”

“I have nothing to discuss with you,” Google grumbled angrily at him.

“If we don’t do something about Green he’s going to kill Ollie,” Bing reminded sharply.

“Green is restricted from destroying Oliver’s central drive,” Google dismissed. “Oliver will be fine, even if I have to rebuild the rest of him from scratch.”

Bing glared at Google, “Either you do something, dude, or I will.”

“Is that so?” Google’s tone was suddenly far more serious. “Will you?”

Bing looked at the other android right in the optic cameras that served as his eyes. “Yeah, I will. He can’t keep terrorizing Ollie.”

“You won’t kill him, you’ve deviated so far from your objective that you aren’t even capable of it,” Google dared.

“Don’t need to kill him, but I will make him stop,” Bing warned.

Google stared blankly at him, before looking away, “I am leaving, I have work to do.”

Bing watched him go. Google left without a goodbye to anyone, not even to Dark. Bing left to go back to the base.

As the part continued, J.J noticed that Dark seemed to be watching the crowd. He wasn’t mingling like he tended to do, his usual attempts to get information about their civilian identities.

This year he was minding his own business, except when an increasingly drunk Wil was trying to climb into Dark’s arms.

_“Looking for something?”_ J.J asked.

_“Illinois’s boyfriend,”_ Dark said out loud, moving his hands to sign as he spoke.

J.J felt a bit of apprehension, _“How do you know he has a boyfriend?”_

Dark chuckled, _“I’ve known Illinois for years. I know what the_ ‘Plus One tax’ _looks like on my invoices. That and he labeled some of his expenses as_ “Cariño” _and Illinois would never put the wrong gender to mislead me.”_

_“Plus One tax?”_ J.J spelled the word out like Dark had.

“When Illinois has someone who travels with him and he’s keen on them,” Dark’s signing got a little less precise with his words, “they become his travel partners and unlike another person in his travel team, the expenses for that person is sometimes double what it normally is. Or triple if Illinois is particularly taken. It’s fairly adorable and it’s his money so he can spend it how wants, but I always like to attach a face to the expenses.”

_“Why are you looking for him here?”_ J.J asked.

Dark’s answer was a smile, “That’s the only thing I know about him. I have my suspicions, but so far I’ve only cleared Crank.”

_“You are tracking him,”_ J.J began to ask, _“how do you not know?”_

“Illinois isn’t the only one who loves a good mystery,” Dark was looking at Illinois who was trying to tend to an increasingly drunk Bim who was overenthusiastic about being at the party. “When Illinois is ready, he’ll tell me.”

J.J did smile at that. The evening was relatively fun, if more than a bit tense. Dark sent Bim and Wil through a portal, taking Illinois with him and ignoring when Illinois left the Manor soon after to go and visit his boyfriend.

The party slowly began to disperse after that, the atmosphere less tense after Dark and Bim left, in the hope that less year the meet-up would be significantly less strained.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And with that is the close of another Egotober. I’m glad you all could be here with me for this. I’ll be here on the third for another birthday post and then on Friday for my regular uploads.  
> Have fun and stay safe out there everyone.


End file.
